The Gathandrian Trilogy 02 - Hallsfoots Battle

not to. Blushing, she turned away, still thinking about what to say.
    “I don’t know,” she said finally. “Perhaps it’s something no one will ever know. Even here in Gathandria, we have to train our minds towards peace. So many years of doing that and we thought everything was as it should be. But it wasn’t. And all our preparation and meditation has not protected our neighbours, or us, has it? Not in the end, not now. And, see, we must turn to war to preserve it…”
    Without warning, Annyeke found she couldn’t continue. Her eyes filled with tears and the colours of her mind were suffused with a deep crimson. Simon leaned forward and patted her hand. His touch radiated uncertainty and compassion in equal measure. The experience of red faded, as suddenly as it had begun. At the window, the snow-raven flapped its wings and Simon glanced at it, nodding as if the bird had spoken. Perhaps it had, she thought, but not to her.
    “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not sure I can really answer your question, Simon. Where does anger and unhappiness come from? Why are there wars? All the books and legends in the whole of our world won’t ever answer that, but perhaps the beginnings of understanding lie in the way we were made. When the light from the Spirit’s hand broke into a thousand pieces, perhaps some of those pieces missed the source of their being so much that the good within them was lost or damaged. Perhaps, returning is what we all long for, and what we fight for is a desire which can never, in fact, be satisfied in this life.”
    In the silence that filled the spaces and the meditation between them after she’d finished speaking, Annyeke blinked. She’d sounded wiser than she’d realised and couldn’t help but smile to herself. She doubted it would happen again, at least not in this day-cycle, so she’d better make the most of it while it lasted.
    It was Simon who spoke first.
    “And while we wait for the answers,” he said, “why not continue with the legend? Tell me, Annyeke, where conflict began.”
    “All right.” She closed her eyes and took herself into that space in her mind that allowed her to speak and feel at the same time.
    “Conflict began in the New Lands, a place where people are most skilled in planting and bringing crops to fruition—or were, before these Wars. Back in the times when legends were not yet written, a man came to the notice of the leaders of the New Landers, but not in a good way. He was the sort of man who wanted more than he would ever achieve, who muttered darkly about the success of others and who desired the highest positions in the land.”
    “What was his name?” Simon whispered, and Annyeke could sense the full focus of his attention on her.
    “His name was Javagathlon,” she said, “or rather that was what his name became. In the language of the ancient New Landers, it means Lust. His true name is lost to us now but, in any case, it no longer matters. In our world, people become the qualities they most cling to. Lust he became and Lust he will always be. For him, the legends tell us, his obsession started with looking at the power and privilege held by the leaders of his people and desiring it most of all. From that, the colours of his mind changed from those he was born with and became red and purple, the colours of violence.”
    “Colours of the mind?” Simon interrupted again, the confusion evident in his tone. She had no need to look at him, fixed as she was on the inner and outer ramifications of her story.
    “Yes,” she replied. “Here in Gathandria, we are able to sense who people are and the shape of their inner worlds by the colours they carry inside. You are most like blue and I am green. At least, those are our base colours, although they change with the days and the moods.”
    “Why can’t I see that, then?”
    She smiled, opened her eyes briefly and saw the frown on his face. “You can. You just don’t fully acknowledge it yet. But, please, may I continue?”
    He blushed. “Of course, forgive me.”
    “There’s nothing to forgive. In the New Lands, Javagathlon looked and looked at the leaders, and hatred grew in his breast for all they had that he did not, although, in our terms, that was little enough. At the same time, the colours of Lust, red, purple and black, also grew in him. And when colours are strong enough in tone or when their arrival in a character fights against what that character truly should be, they