The Gathandrian Trilogy 01 - The Gifting

discovered about his cousin. The reasons for Simon’s weakness give a bitter taste to his tongue. Still, he cannot allow him to die; the elders have commissioned him, and he is honour-bound to obey. But here in the Lammas Lands, imprisonment recently has come to mean only one thing. Death is surely what Hartstongue faces now.
    “Sit,” Isabella says at last, gathering up her herbs and storing them for safety in the pouch she always carries. “You cannot afford to waste your energy.”
    “No.” Johan can only agree, though his memories of recent days have stirred his blood, and stillness does not come easily. Not as it used to back in Gathandria.
    When he is seated opposite her, Isabella reaches for his hand. “Come, brother, let us meditate together. Then we will be strong and prepared for whatever comes next.”
    He nods. His sister is always the calming voice of wisdom. How glad he is that this journey has given her a purpose beyond missing Petran. For that reason alone, he knows the mission is right. He closes his eyes, and feels the mind of his sister intertwine with his.
    When the meditation is only three-quarters through, he knows what he has to do next.

    Isabella
    Hartstongue is more important to Gelahn than her brother understands. Perhaps more important than she understands. Important enough to want to kill him. As Johan meditates, Isabella sets her mind into its familiar place so that her brother will realise nothing.
    Then she drifts away, over the rocks that lead down from this cave, through the woods and back to the village. It is night-time; the people are sleeping. The scribe’s house—a favour-gift from his former protector—should be empty but she sees it is not. One small boy crouches under the writing table, clutching something in his hands. He is crying and rocking himself. Over and over again. Men are so weak. Even young, they are not as strong as women. She wonders what the boy might be holding, but she does not stop to look. Her purpose lies elsewhere.
    Her mind travels through the village, past the well, then up the slight incline and to the Lammas Lands’ castle. It’s a magnificent building even in moonlight. Tregannon is a lucky man. But she is concerned with neither the castle, nor its owner, now.
    Once again, her meeting is with Gelahn. She laughs inside at the knowledge that her brother does not yet know that the true mind-healer is already here. No matter—he will find out soon enough. And when what must be done is done, their meaningless journey will be over. Gelahn will have won.

    Simon
    He was at Ralph’s castle, as his prisoner. Ralph’s prisoner. No longer his protected servant or favoured companion.
    What had happened since their last parting to change his mind? And when would the Overlord kill him?
    Simon’s mind hammered with questions, and containing them made his skin itch. He shook his head, tried to ignore the stench around him, and thought back over the recent past that had brought him here.
    He had spent the last two year-cycles serving the owner of the Lammas Lands, a country of rich woods and verdant farmland, situated between the northern mountains and the mud plains of the south, bounded eastward and westward only by the sea. Or so they had always been told, but of course nobody travelled far these days. Not even Simon. He had seen the mountains from afar but had never journeyed there, nor to the distant sea. Not that he was a native here—no, his home was the White Lands, a moon-long journey to the south, beyond the mud plains. A land very different from Lammas, it was—in his distant memory—a land of white soil and tall cattle. He had been born in the village of Hartstongue, where the great deer and wild bear roamed, but he never visited now. It would be dangerous. He would no longer be welcome there. Each day, Simon thanked the gods and stars that the connections between individual lands had grown so weak, and no one came searching for him.
    Here, in the Lammas Lands, he’d found a kind of safety. Ralph Tregannon, its Lord, was seen by the regional landowners beneath him, and those who lived in their jurisdiction, as an enlightened man, and also a maverick, someone who did not balk at secret dealings, even with mind-dwellers such as Simon. When it suited him.
    And using Simon’s skills did suit him; in these rebellious times, it gave Ralph an advantage others couldn’t hope to gain. It gave him the additional power he needed to rule more