The Gathandrian Trilogy 03 - The Executioners Cane

means one of only two things: Simon has come either to save them, or destroy them. Or perhaps both. Perhaps his reasoning is too narrow. Nothing about their whole sorry history has fallen the way Ralph would have wished it.
    It strikes him for the first time that, with the cane, Simon can take what revenge he wishes upon him. He has the power to drive Ralph to the floor, prostrate him until he is begging to be released from the agony the mind-cane can bring about. For the pains he has inflicted on Simon alone – let alone on his country – he has every right to do so. Ralph will not run. He will accept whatever the gods and stars have in store.
    Simon does nothing. He simply stares at Ralph. Like a man drinking down a flagon of water when he has been thirsty for many days, but who does not know what poisons may lurk within.
    The mind-cane in his grasp leaps in his fingers but Simon holds onto it. Frankel steps away further. Something draws Ralph’s eye and he glances down. The emeralds are the brightest green he has ever seen them, but their warmth is missing. They are as cold as a tree in winter.
    “Ralph,” Simon whispers at last. His voice is hoarse. He sounds as if he has much to say but the words are trapped in his mouth.
    It is then Ralph understands that, whatever happens, he can do no good. Neither to Simon nor to any of the people in his care. All the power has gone to the scribe, the very man he once lorded it over, and Ralph has no place here. The castle, the villages, all the lands are Simon’s. The only thing he himself can do is to step aside.
    As the last of the Tregannons, this is something he should do with dignity, holding on in some measure to the gifts his father gave him. But, after what has happened, Ralph’s mind is nothing more than a tattered wisp of what it once was. He has been fooling only himself with the hope anything can be different.
    He curses in his mother’s language. Not with the words of the Tregannons, but with the words of those they claimed to despise.
    Frankel cries out something and Simon steps forward. He seems stronger now but Ralph does not allow him to speak. He flings down the remaining emeralds at the scribe’s feet. Ralph is worthy of none of them. The jewels scatter like river-stones across the stone slabs of the hall. He does not wait to see where they will come to rest or what Simon will do.
    Instead, he swings round and strides back the way he has come in unthinking hope. Back to the private rooms. Back to the dark.

    Simon

    The moment Ralph disappeared, the scribe dropped the cane and collapsed down onto the floor, running his hands through his hair. Frankel hovered around him, putting his weight first on one foot then another. If Simon hadn’t had the mind-energy knocked from him, he might even have thought this was amusing. Instead he could feel the rapid thud of his heart and the dryness in his throat. He should have been prepared for this, shouldn’t he? He’d come here to help Ralph, to help the Lammas Lands. He’d wanted to see Ralph, by the gods and stars, and he’d got his desire.
    But he hadn’t expected to see the Lammas Master in such depths of surely insurmountable pain. The moment the man had walked in upon them, the sharp crimson jaggedness of his broken mind had swept over Simon like a winter storm. He’d hardly been able to breathe. He’d known Ralph would be damaged from the wars and from his encounters with the mind-executioner. Hadn’t he himself received thought-wounds he refused to remember fully from the cursed Gelahn? So, he’d expected this: pain, grief, regret and deep confusion. But the Lammas Overlord’s mind was barely there. Simply a series of impressions with no linking structure. This was not something Simon knew how to solve. Not at once, anyway. Even though the mere sight of Ralph had satisfied a need in Simon he knew could not be spirited away by any cane or emeralds, that didn’t matter. They had to find a quick solution to the troubles facing this land, before the winter depths were fully upon them. Otherwise the people would starve and Ralph would not be able to help them. They needed another way. But what? He groaned aloud and Frankel bent over him.
    “Are you all right?” The old man’s eyes darted from where the scribe sat hunched on the floor to where the Overlord had vanished through the darkened doorway. Simon didn’t need to fathom his companion’s mind to know the appearance of the castle’s