The Gathandrian Trilogy 02 - Hallsfoots Battle

but wait and wonder.
    So the mind-executioner floats within the Gathandrian Library. He cannot understand the purpose of it. If he is to be taunted with being here, then his tormentor is succeeding. So many year-cycles has Duncan longed for the chance to visit this place once more. The Library has been a part of his plans for returning, a distant vision to work for included in his future triumph. To win this life again, he will do anything.
    Anything. He has made his pact with the dark and he will not gainsay it, even if the path back were to be opened to him ever again.
    You cannot go back. You have walked too far with the night.
    The Spirit of the Library is speaking again, strange coloured words flashing danger into his mind. He knows that what the Spirit speaks is true. The day he began his rebellion against the Gathandrian elders, so many generation-cycles in the past, was the day he walked away from the road of hope. Injustices had been done to him, his talents ignored and all his ambitions burnt to nothing. The anger has been the only thing that sustained him. He will live by it still.
    The night is my friend, he answers the voice. I wish for no other companion. Bringing me here, for whatever purpose, will not change that. I will save Gathandria in my way, because your way, the way of words and stories, has always failed. This land is mine alone and one day I will reclaim it. One day, whether I live or not, silence will be king.
    As Duncan finishes speaking, a roaring torrent rips through his blood and bone and flesh and he opens his mouth and screams. There is no sound. The agony is beyond its physical retelling. He feels as if every part of him is being torn away and reattached to himself in a different place. For a moment, he wonders if this is what the victims of the mountain-dogs feel, when he unleashes them. Then the terrible noise vanishes and he is whole again, with a greater knowledge of who it is who has helped him here. Both of them. Something unfamiliar reaches his ear, a slow creaking. He turns to face whatever will happen next.
    The door to the great Library opens. When he sees which one of his unexpected allies it is, Duncan smiles.

    Simon
    Iffenia had conveyed to his mind that the Gathandrian Library had once been beautiful but had been all but destroyed in the recent wars. Situated next to the Council of Elders’ building, the scribe thought it still had a kind of glory. Stonework had been sheered through and none of the windows had glass as far as he could see. The roof was entirely missing. In spite of that, the height of the structure still drew the eye and some of the carvings remained. Peering closer, he could see intricate scenes of men and women poring over books, examples of Gathandrian artwork, all of it framed by the trees these people seemed to love so well. Gelahn had not entirely defeated the city then.
    Still followed by his two strange companions, he entered the interior gloom. Already, it was all but night and the chill in the air made him shiver. He wondered how Iffenia could have imagined that any books might be stored here. It was obvious to him that such surroundings would only ruin them.
    “Welcome, Lost One.”
    The voice made him swing round but he could see nobody. “Hello? Where-Where are you?”
    “I am nowhere.”
    “What…?”
    “And everywhere.”
    Without warning, the mind-cane, which had been lurking at the edge of his sight, flew to the scribe’s hand. He tried to twist away but the cane twisted too, and landed in his palm. He cried out but already his fingers were wrapping round its slim frame. A flash of blue sparked upwards and then the cane was still. Simon had braced himself to scream but this time there was no pain, no sensation of burning. It was as if he and the cane were poised to fight together as they had briefly before, but here there was no enemy, unless, of course, he counted the disembodied voice.
    “That is as it should be.”
    The scribe could take no more of this. He had experienced enemies in his mind and in the flesh, but never an enemy who was invisible yet did not assault his thoughts.
    He took two paces forward, brandishing the cane in front of him as if it were a weapon he knew how to use. “Who are you? Name yourself. ”
    From behind, the snow-raven took to the air, his wings brushing Simon’s face. The scribe gasped because, as the bird flew in an arc around the half-broken hall he found himself in, his flight lit up the