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  “I can make no use of things I do not understand, can I?” he countered. “And, as this is the first time I have ever been here, then believe me, I understand nothing, but I will offer you one of my secrets if it will help you. My name is Simon Hartstongue of the…White Lands and I am a scribe. I am, I am told by others, also One Who is Lost, but neither of these truths can bring you harm.”

  Kanlin shook his head and stepped away, while the younger brother smiled and tried to hide it.

  “I greet you,” he said. “Welcome, Simon Hartstongue, to our world. My name is Ahelos and I am a tiller of crops. My brother, Kanlin, is the protector of our livestock, and we rely on him for many things. I, and all of our people, could not do without him.”

  Ahelos’ expression softened as he spoke and he reached out a cautious hand to touch his brother’s shoulder. Kanlin snorted and pulled away. Ahelos shrugged. In the silence, a distant shout attracted their attention, and the scribe looked up to see one or two of the men in the disappearing group waving at them. Ahelos waved back as Kanlin spoke.

  “Come, then, we must get back,” he said. “The stranger may follow us if he wishes, but he must find shelter elsewhere. We have no room for him.”

  Simon was about to respond that he had not thought of following them, but the mind-cane fizzed in one hand and a surge of heat from the book almost burnt the other. Still, he did not let go of either, as he had been ordered. After a few moments, the burning sensation faded and he could breathe again.

  In the meantime, Ahelos had clapped him on the back and set out towards the houses. “Come, then, you may rest with one of our neighbours, if my brother will give you no room. But, first, I must gather elm nuts for supper.”

  “You should have done that earlier. We will have to hurry,” Kanlin grumbled but made no other complaint as the three of them veered towards the woods, already darkening in the twilight gloom. Bare branches twisted at the sky as if caught in a wild dance to an unheard music and, from somewhere, Simon heard the call of a hunting owl.

  As he strode behind the two men, the scribe thought it odd that he could pick up no individual thoughts from the brothers themselves. His only understanding emanated from the sensations filtered through the book and he could not tell their origin. He had a sense of history, as if this place, these people, had been here for generation-cycles beyond numbering, and would always be here. Beyond that, the background hum of the village-dwellers’ feelings, exhaustion, satisfaction, hunger, the need for sleep, friendship, love and peace. More frightening emotions, too, swirled in the void left by men and women who had never been real, fear, jealousy, resentment and hatred. All these passed over him and he could not make them stop, or understand their meaning, not fully. He was new to this.

  Nearer the trees, Ahelos took out a pouch from his belt that he unfolded and handed to his brother. “Come then, if we both gather the elm nuts, then we will the sooner be home.”

  “And free from the threat of the river foxes,” Kanlin added.

  The scribe did not like the sound of such animals, but decided asking would only bring an answer to his question and he did not want to know. He thought he, too, should perhaps offer to help, but the younger brother shook his head, smiling.

  “I have only two belt pouches,” he said. “And, besides, I see you already have your own burdens to carry. You will have to keep watch for us.”

  Before Simon could object, Ahelos had turned away and was striding deeper into the wood, Kanlin by his side. In the sky, the snow-raven continued to wheel and dance an intricate pattern, each change of direction accompanied by a harsh whistling. The scribe shivered and plunged into the trees.

  They swallowed him up. Tall, interlocked branches cut out most of the dying light and the only glimmer came from the silver carvings on the top of the cane. He could hear a constant low howling and wondered whether that could be one of the river-foxes—whatever they were—before realising it was only the wind. His own foolishness made him smile but, nevertheless, he tracked the brothers and kept watch as best he could, not that he knew how he could protect them from danger if it transpired. He had no weapon, only the cane, and it did not always act as he might wish. If it chose to be, it was stronger than any knife. But the scribe could not guarantee its choice, especially in a fictional world such as this, no matter how real it felt.

  To his left, he caught the bulky shadow of Kanlin hunkering down beside a great tree-trunk and gathering handfuls of what must be the elm nuts, pouring them into the belt pouch. Ahelos he couldn’t see. His slight figure must be hidden amongst the trees.

  The scribe took a step forward, drawing together his scant supply of courage to tell the older man that already he had failed in his task. He had not been keeping watch and the younger brother had vanished. At the same time, a wave of thick blackness swept over him and he found he couldn’t move at all. The book felt cold to his touch and the mind-cane’s silver ceased to glow.

  Ahelos appeared on the other side of Kanlin. The man crouching down failed to notice. From instinct, Simon opened his mouth to cry a warning, but no sound came out. Something glittered in the younger brother’s hand. A heartbeat later, the scribe saw it was a knife. This shining object plunged deep into the figure of the older man, who cried out and fell backwards against the tree. Dark liquid gushed from the wound, and the scribe felt the sticky wetness spray against his face. He turned, able to move at last, and vomited into the undergrowth. From the edge of his vision, he saw the knife rise and fall again, twice, and then Kanlin was silent.

  “Please,” the scribe heard himself say. “Please…”

  “Hush your mouth,” came Ahelos’ reply, his voice now changed from the charm of before into a harsher tone. And still Simon could sense none of the man’s emotions. “I have to make sure my brother is dead.”

  “Why have you killed him?” The question was in the air before the scribe could prevent it and he would have given much of the little he owned, and all he didn’t, to pull the question back.

  Ahelos laughed. “Would you not wish to? He has spent years of his life belittling me and taking what is mine. He deserves to die. It is a miracle he has survived thus far.”

  “You will be punished. Even if you k-kill me, those you live with will find it out, no matter how far you run.” The scribe wished he’d sounded stronger, but his stammer under pressure couldn’t be helped. He also wished he’d had the sense to remain silent or even to run, but the taste of vomit in his mouth seemed to force words out of him he would never otherwise have said. Likewise, the tremble in his legs betrayed his need to escape.

  “Ah, but I don’t intend to run,” whispered Ahelos, and now Simon could see the glitter of the knife streaked with its black globules of blood as it came ever closer. “Because you, a stranger, are here. I’d thought of a river fox as the killer of my beloved brother, but why should not a stranger be a murderer just as well?”

  “I-I don’t want to kill anyone,” the scribe tried to back away but the mind-cane hummed in his hand and once more he found he couldn’t move. From somewhere beyond the trees, he heard the snow-raven’s cry.

  “Nobody knows that,” Ahelos said with a laugh. “I’ll say you followed us, tried to rob us and killed my brother. Then I, in my natural anger, killed you. Justice was done.”

  He brought the knife down. The steel, still warm from Kanlin’s body, touched Simon’s arm on its way to his belly. The scribe cried out. The mind-cane screamed but not with fear and, the next moment, Simon drove the cane into Ahelos’ face.

  He was hoping only to fend off his assailant, but the mind-cane had a different purpose. As the ebony touched the murderous brother, fire leapt from it, suffused with the wild humming. The sound was so piercing that Simon was forced to cover his ears with his arms, although the overwhelming noise was in his thoughts, also, and that could not be gainsaid. Ahelos’ hair burst into a dark crimson flame that ran down his body, licking away tunic and skin and flesh. The smell of burning dr
ove all other thoughts away and the scribe turned and vomited again.

  When he looked round, the air was still and the humming had stopped. The mind-cane was motionless. The snow-raven was perched on a branch nearby that swayed under his weight. The bird was glowing and a single speck of bright blood marked his head. Simon couldn’t help but shake. He longed to drop both the book of this legend and the cane, but his fingers would not let go. He glanced at the ground. Ahelos lay at his feet. In the light cast through the trees by the snow-raven, Simon could see the man’s face and skin were burnt away.

  He swore with words he had heard Ralph say in what seemed a lifetime ago. His heart was beating at such a pace but he could not breathe in enough air. He’d killed Ahelos. He’d killed him, when he’d sworn to himself he would not kill again. He hadn’t meant to. Dropping to his knees, Simon peered into his victim’s features, or what he could see of them. He could sense nothing, but that was no surprise—he had been unable to link with either of these men while they lived, so how could he understand fully when they had died?

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered to no one. “I’m sorry.”

  The snow-raven gave a low whistle and Ahelos’ eyes flickered open. Simon gasped but could not draw back. Somehow, his eyes had been saved from the all-consuming flame, but the scribe did not think they focused on anything. The glint of life was fading away. Ahelos was dying.

  In the silence after the raven’s call, he realised he could hear something but didn’t know what it was. A quick search around him revealed no danger, but still the low noise continued. It formed itself into words. He stared at Ahelos. Yes, his lips were moving, his teeth glittering strangely as they worked the sound into shapes.

  More than anything, the scribe wanted to run. It was always his first, his most pressing instinct. Instead, now, he shut his eyes, told himself that because of what he had done, he had to stay. Then he leaned forward, moving his ear to the remains of Ahelos’ mouth. It took half a story’s beginning to hear what he was saying and, even then, understanding did not follow in the wake of knowledge.

  “You are the justice-bringer after all, you are he…”

  The same words spoken over and over again, but so quietly and fading so rapidly that Simon did not, at first, believe he’d heard it at all.

  At last, the talking stopped. Ahelos’ eyes dulled to nothing and closed. Simon was alone. Finding what little strength he had left, he staggered to his feet and backed away until he felt the solidity of bark and leaf. With a fierce shout, he flung both the book and the mind-cane as far from himself as he could. The cane landed with a dull thump in leaf-mulch and the book hit the branch of an ash standing opposite and stayed, entangled by twigs. Its green glow vanished at once and the light from the snow-raven began to fade.

  At the same time, a hand that was not his reached out and plucked the discarded book from the tree. Before he could think whether it was one of the brothers’ fellow villagers and, if it were, what he might say, a voice spoke, but only to his mind.

  It was Gelahn. A slight dark-eyed figure dressed in the way Simon had first encountered him, a black over-tunic edged with white circles. The cloak, he knew, would be trimmed with the shape of a pentagon, although now he could not see it. His heart skittered in his throat and his thoughts became as ice. With the mind-executioner’s presence, the scent of fire and darkness deepened and, behind Gelahn, the shadows of another that the scribe could not quite make out.

  If you cannot bear the story, the mind-executioner said, then you are nothing but a fool to tell it.

  Fourth Lammas Lands Chronicle

  PRUDENCE AND SLOTH

  Ralph

  Something has happened. He no longer senses the mind-executioner’s presence in his home, although the snarling of the mountain dogs in the bedroom can be heard as far as the great hall. The fact of Gelahn’s absence snapped into Ralph’s mind as soon as he limped into the shelter of home, the irritation of his encounter with Jemelda in the kitchens still fresh on his skin.

  Where is he?

  His first thought is it must be a trick. Gelahn is testing him by hiding himself so completely that Ralph does not know when he will appear next. He is waiting to see what the Overlord will do.

  Ralph shakes the rain from his hair and takes off his boots. The stone slabs freeze his feet and he reaches for the cloth he keeps by the cloak store. Not bothering to find a chair, he simply sits on the floor and dries himself as best he may. In recent times, this would have been a servant’s job and the change in routine makes him grimace. No matter. For the foreseeable future-cycle, this is something he will have to grow accustomed to.

  And, all the time, under this light clatter of thought that he hopes masks at least some of the deeper part of his mind, Ralph is pondering on weightier matters. Whenever Gelahn is here he has, up until now, always been able to sense him. If this is a trick, it is a good one. But why would the mind-executioner do this? He has the power over Ralph that he wishes. Even if, by some strange miracle, there are things Gelahn does not know or has not yet spoken of, like the presence of the emeralds, the fact remains that Ralph does not know how to use their magic and so the knowledge of them is worse than useless.

  A sudden lurch takes him. The emeralds. They hid the boy from Gelahn. Perhaps, then, the mind-executioner has already discovered them and that is why Ralph does not sense him now. The emeralds—may their power and all the gods and stars that made them be cursed—are hiding his enemy from him, also. Gelahn is still here, he would not leave without taking the wretched dogs with him, and he is using Ralph’s own so-called cunning to taunt him.

  Ralph scrambles upright, still cursing under his breath, and launches himself through the hall towards the ancient oak staircase and the bedrooms above. His breath comes in short gasps and he almost stumbles over the last of his own dogs. No time to stop. It is quicker this way than if he uses the passage’s outside entrance. He needs to see Gelahn now before he takes his vengeance on any of the people, if that is his plan. Ralph needs to try to explain, though he has no excuses.

  The executioner will see the emeralds. He will know how to mine them in full and any advantage Ralph has will be gone. How his father would cast Ralph out now if he could see what his son has done. All the Tregannons’ power and hope vanished in a tenth of the time his father took to build it. He was right about Ralph all along.

  At the door to the room Gelahn has taken, Ralph finally remembers the mountain dogs. Their howling wraps round him, snapping at his flesh. Gods and stars. But he cannot retrace his steps. He must see the mind-executioner and understand the shape of the landscape he must meet. To wait for Gelahn to reveal himself would be impossible.

  He might even be inside Ralph’s room now. He has no way of telling.

  Swinging round, he slams his fists on the wall and lets loose another guttural curse in his mother’s tongue. For a moment, the sound of his voice almost holds back the baying of the dogs. In that moment, and not caring what may come from his actions, Ralph opens the door and plunges inside.

  The darkness swallows him up. It nearly makes him stop, too, but he has sense enough not to do so. The mountain dogs are causing the darkness. They must be. It’s moving and he can see vague shapes appearing and disappearing within it. Red eyes, the flash of bare teeth, the husky tendrils of their breath, and always, always, the noise of them. Not simply the overpowering sound of pack dogs that makes the ear tingle when they’re on the hunt, but something meaner and more insistent, a baying that plunders the mind.

  He doesn’t know what to do now he’s here, and he wonders why he ever thought he could do this. His face is wet and his fists are clenched, but he’s still moving, across the room, towards the secret door. Now is not a good time to think about whether he can fit through the gap to the passageway quickly enough, or whether or not the emeralds are still there. It will be a strong magic, indeed, if they are. Already, he senses that Gelahn is not here or, if he is, he’s not showing himself—mock
ing Ralph’s attempts to confront him, no doubt, and watching his defeat with pleasure.

  The dogs are onto him now. They’ve caught the scent. He can see more glimpses of teeth and twenty-strong pairs of crimson eyes. Perhaps more. The nature of their howling changes, it’s more purposeful, they have a victim, by all the gods.

  If he dies, what will become of his people?

  He lunges at the wall just as the nearest mountain dog rips into his already injured leg. Blood spurts hot from his skin and he can’t help his scream. The first dog’s action is a signal for the others and they tear into him, cruel jaws fastening on arms, hair, body, whatever they can find. They’ll kill him here. He cannot defeat them.

  Please, please, his thoughts beg for mercy but there is no one to heed the plea. And, already, the dogs are beyond his body into his mind. In his last thought before the terror takes hold, Ralph understands to the full how Simon must have felt when he was fighting for his life on the mountain.

  Then all thought is obliterated as a torrent of blackness sweeps across him. Not just blackness though, but one interspersed with crimson and orange and silver, slashing at his mind like knives. Someone is whimpering. Ralph thinks it’s himself. All the aspects of his life he has held dear for so long—the position he has in the Lammas Lands, his family line, the riches, the responsibilities—are torn from his grasp and vanish in a howl of pure pain. In real hand-to-hand battle, he could fight this, but here he cannot. Here there is no time or ebb and flow of violence, but it all occurs at once and without respite. Ralph cannot tell how long the mountain dogs rip apart his thoughts with their cruel teeth and howling but, at some point, only the gods and stars know when, he becomes aware of his right hand—in the body, not simply a vision of it. Something hot is digging into his palm. It sends splinters of pain through the deep ache of his mind. He doesn’t know what it is, but it makes him think he’s not dead yet, perhaps not even in the death that is no death which only the mind-executioner can bring.