The Gathandrian Trilogy 02 - Hallsfoots Battle

in the deserts or the woods. The Spirit cried out in grief and its sorrow filled the world. The tears shed followed the fragments of the notes, drawn to them by their mystery and magic, and fell likewise into the sea, the mountains, the rivers, the plains, the deserts and the woods. Harmony and tears were joined, melted together and formed something new and equally magical, which was born out of joy and sorrow, and lives to acknowledge both men and women. This is how men and women were first made.”
    Annyeke paused in her narration. It was a long time since she had revisited the Gathandrian Creation Legend, and she had almost forgotten its power, and the way it made her feel connected to the earth and the life around her. She promised herself she would try not to leave it so little remembered again.
    Glancing up from her posture of quasi meditation, she saw Simon was gazing at her, his expression rapt. Around him hung a strange glow, deep blue in shade, she thought, though even as she looked at it, the impression of colour faded away and she wondered if she’d seen it at all. The snow-raven, too, gazed at her, perched on the end of the table, head cocked. Even the mind-cane was silent. How could they know what she was saying? Was it something in the harmony of the words themselves, spoken aloud even without the mind-link?
    “Go on,” the scribe whispered. “What happened next?”
    “The Spirit departed,” Annyeke continued, “to travel to wherever it is that Spirits go. But it left something of itself here, both in our people and in the world we live in. All those generation-cycles ago, the people who came from tears and light began to multiply and grow strong in number. At first, everything was shared within the whole community, so that nobody suffered lack and all beings were equal. Here in Gathandria, men and women worked together, building great places of light and beauty, both dwellings and for entertainment or command. That is how the city was born, the first city of the world we live in. There will never be another like it.
    “Elsewhere, in the other Kingdoms, creatures were echoing our ancestors’ progress, in all their different lives. The Kingdom of the Sea teemed with fish and strange sea-monsters. They filled the waters and subdued them, their power limited only by the land that bordered their domain. In the desert, the desert men and women grew tall and pale, their skin whitened by the need to live their lives always seeking for the shade but blanched by the sun. Once the desert was crowded with their homes and communities, but now there is nothing left, their civilisation destroyed by the mind-wars. At the same time, the snow-ravens spread their wings across the Kingdom of the Air and made the skies their own, scorning the lesser pleasures of the earth. Finally, amongst the Kingdoms, the great mountains that border the Lammas Lands swallowed up the men who fell there from the Spirit’s fingers. Flesh became stone, and man melded into the earth.
    “In this blessed time, Gathandria’s neighbours also grew and prospered. Amongst the larger of them that you know are these—the White Lands rich in the skills of writing, the feudal comfort of the Lammas Lands and their Overlords and the Marsh Lands where people can live from anything the water gives them.
    “After a while, though—and, again, no one can measure how long the time was—factions began to appear, partly based on the differences between man and man, and partly on the areas they lived in, the different skills they possessed. People began to fight each other, and every unnecessary violent death was felt here in the City.”
    “Why?” Simon interrupted. “Why did conflict begin when they were accustomed to live in peace? The differences you talk about. Surely they must have always been there. They would be familiar, not dangerous. Why does everything have to end with fighting?”
    Annyeke took a moment to gather her mind together before replying. The combination of the legend’s power and her own semi-meditation could not be abandoned lightly. She could also sense from the scribe’s aura how much he needed to know the answer to his questions. With that understanding came revelation—Simon was, at heart, a dreamer, although this trait was buried so deep that he probably didn’t know it himself. Too many years spent simply trying to survive and…
    She shook her head; she had no right to pry, especially since he had asked her