The Gathandrian Trilogy 02 - Hallsfoots Battle

were anything but laughter. “No, not this time. I’ve been lucky.”
    “Or perhaps the cane helped clarify the First Legend of Gathandria by giving you a glimpse of its meaning? My solidified lust against the fortitude you have gained from your travels.”
    Now the scribe did laugh. “I have little enough of that, believe me. Anything I do is achieved despite my own reluctance and more by the help of others than by any strength of my own. Surely, my story tells you that.”
    But she continued to insist, despite his objections. “There is more than one interpretation to any life. You must be open to other truths and not narrow your own character so.”
    In the end, they agreed to differ. However, before the meditation ended and while Annyeke gathered up the small jewels that had arisen from her, another thought occurred to him, one that really should have occurred earlier.
    “You speak of other interpretations,” he said, “but if the story brought out the sparks of lust in you and solidified them, why didn’t it do the same for the fortitude I know you surely have?”
    “Good question,” Annyeke said with a frown. “The truth is I don’t know. Right now that’s only one of the many things that are worrying me.”

Third Lammas Lands Chronicle
    JUSTICE AND ANGER

    Duncan Gelahn
    Failure is not the end. He should have learned that lesson, having been imprisoned for so long and so cruelly by the Elders of Gathandria. The recent despair he has been mired in was harsh but brief, and now Gelahn’s plans are sharp and clear once more. He has swept through Tregannon’s mind, breaching what little defences he had, and found nothing but fear, hatred and a hard-won respect. More than all, however, at the centre of his thoughts, the Lammas Land’s Overseer is still convinced that obedience to the mind-executioner is the best way of saving his people.
    That will be Ralph Tregannon’s downfall, because Gelahn has already decided that once the wretched scribe is dead and Gathandria is his, then he has no more need of the Overseer. Let the fool perish with his erstwhile lover. The two of them deserve nothing less.
    He smiles and gazes round the master bedroom of Tregannon’s castle. He has taken it for his own and the choice pleases him. Tregannon himself has had to move into a sparsely furnished guest room. It is what he deserves.
    Here, in the unaccustomed comfort of silks and linens, he can think how best to fight his blood-enemies and win. Without the mind-cane, the battle will be more tormented, but Gelahn knows his mind-skills are still more powerful than many of those he will face. After all, he is a mind-executioner, and a man feared by all. Not only that, but he has the mountain dogs, their abilities even more powerful now with the inclusion of the agony he’d taken from the dying mountain—a small sacrifice for a greater good. These truths are enough of an advantage for him even in difficult circumstances. And, by the stars, he has experience of difficult circumstances. Fighting without the cane will simply be another obstacle to overcome. The temporary loss of his dignity on the Gathandrian shores against the unfocused rage of the scribe and the strange antics of the mind-cane has been nothing but a victory delayed because the more the mind-executioner dwells on the possibilities of physical battle with a city that has never fought one, the more he finds he is smiling again. As he considers his options, he spreads a mind-net over his thoughts so none but he can access them. Doing so is almost second nature with him now.
    If he can force Tregannon to bring together the army he already has and to prepare them for war with his mind-tricks, then the most pressing problem left to Gelahn is how to transport them to the battle zone because the Gathandrians will not fight such a battle on anything but their own territories. That much is certain. Their ridiculous fear of damaging the people and lands of those “under their care” will prevent them from coming to him. He must go to them. Of course, in the city itself, their mind-power is stronger, but they will not have the advantage of trained fighting men.
    Gelahn blinks. His smile deepens.
    Why should the fighting men even need to be alive? He raised the desert people from the dead once before. Many in the Lammas Lands armies are dead also, but that is no reason why they cannot be part of his victory along with living men. To do that without the cane,