Joseph L. Selby

 

These events take place succeeding Dyv5-08 Casualties of War.

 

            The winter of CY 594 proving the exception, it does not snow in the Free Lands of Dyvers. The geography is by no uncertain means a temperate area of the Flanaess, but for reasons that diviners and sages cannot fully explain, it does not snow there. Most attribute the strange occurrence to the magical properties of the Bottomless Lake, but no one knows for sure. Instead of snow, rain heralds winter in the Free Lands. Rain that falls to the earth like stones and quickly builds up into thick rivulets to race down the unpaved streets of the region’s smaller villages and hamlets as if they were separated by a canal. The city proper itself boasts a complex sewer system that keeps the majority of water from lingering on the streets above. However, the convicted criminals—murders and traitors of the worst sort—turned gelatinous cubes that clean the sewers year-round take the opportunity to mindlessly relive their more contemptible past by blocking the waterways and flooding the streets. The frigidity of the winter past is pushed to the back of the mind by those who survived and not fully appreciated by those newly arrived to the city, following the new trade route to Admundfort across the Nyr Dyv.

            Today it rains across the Free Lands, from Westguard to Eastguard, from Great Crown Island to the depths of the Gnarley Forest. And though it does little to dampen the spirits of those citizens that endured the many trials of this most recent year—the magister’s departure and return, the One Day War, and the invasion of Admundfort—it reflects perfectly the mood in Caltaran, more specifically the mood in Grandhearth Manor. In his private study, Klabert Lord Grandhearth, governor of Caltaran and newly appointed magistrate of the Westlands, stairs out the window. The beautiful grounds of the manor house are obscured by the water pouring down the glass panes. He pays them little attention regardless. His face reflects in the window, dancing with the flickering candlelight cast from a table behind him. The door to the study is closed and has been all day. The staff has been told that the family values its space in these trying times. Klabert’s second wife, Maenda, is upstairs with their daughter. The half-elf matron has scarcely left the toddler’s side in the past few weeks. To be honest, Grandhearth is thankful for that fact. The recent traumatic experience has shaken his faith in Dyvers to its very foundations. Assumptions he once took as unquestionable truths of his beloved nation have turned to questions. To what lengths will people go to advance their own agendas? To what degree should a nation that values its independence and the liberty it affords its citizens tolerate the presence of a drow woman corrupting the souls of that citizenry? When is it time to forego those liberties and punish the wicked? If not for a few brave adventurers, that faith would have been destroyed entirely.

            Faith, however, remains in short supply in Lord Grandhearth’s study. Lying across the plush red velvet cushions of a couch in the center of the room, Enruhl Grandhearth-Leardyn, once Lord Leardyn, governor of the Westlands, stairs up at the ceiling. His right hand, gripped firmly around a half-empty goblet, sways rhythmically back and forth, although neither man hears a tune. His opposite hand clutches a bottle of Leardynian Gold Wine in a vice grip. Although some may mistake the man’s condition as a result of too much merry-making, the puffy bags beneath his eyes reveal the truth of his situation. Stripped of his nobility for doing what he still believes to be the best interest of the Free Lands, Enruhl mourns not the loss of his lordship, but the loss of his eldest son.

            “Ethane must be awfully damp. I wish they had given him a hat,” Enruhl slurs. He swings the goblet forcefully, spilling some of the wine on the valuable rug below. “No one should be in this weather without a hat…or at least a decent cloak.”

            “Please, cousin,” Klabert says softly, “not again.” He turns from his reflection and looks at his guest. He wishes he could offer the man some comfort, but he understands the misery a father feels when his child is taken from him.

            “Not again?” Leardyn’s tone bites like a snake. “Should I simply expunge the image of my son’s severed head hanging from Thrommel’s Arch? Cast it aside like an unwanted pebble along the lakeshore? Eh, cousin?” His eyes squint, piercing Klabert’s gaze until Grandhearth is forced to look away.

            “I will not fight you, Enruhl. I share your sorrow, but I am not the villain here.”

            “Do you remember how his body squirmed? What an unnatural thing for a headless corpse to do, to dance as if the greatest bard had just struck up a tune.” Tears well up in Leardyn’s eyes, neither the first nor the last he has shed since Ethane’s execution three days prior. “He’s gone Klabert.”

            “His spirit will find comfort with the Invincible, cousin. Of that, I am certain.” Lord Grandhearth moves to the sofa and places his hand gently on Enruhl’s shoulder. A growing concern, his cousin has long found comfort in a bottle of wine. Although the issue seemed to have run its course with the absence of the magister, since the One Day War and Larissa’s return, the problem has grown steadily worse. Although Klabert does not mean to be unfeeling, he truly does not know what to say. What words will console his most favorite relation without setting off the beast of inebriation prowling within?

            “His spirit will find no rest. It is trapped within that thing. On so many occasions I have shared company with George Good, yet the man so willingly sent my son into the dungeons of the Four Towers and turned him into a gelatinous cube. His soul is trapped in that monster, and it will wander the sewers forever slurping at the refuse of the city. It is intolerable. It is cruel.”

            “You mustn’t think that way, Enruhl. The boy’s spirit had passed before Good went to task. Magister Hunter would not condemn Ethane to such a fate, regardless of the boy’s supposed crime.” Grandhearth gently takes the bottle from his cousin’s hand and returns it to the liquor tray. Only paces behind, Leardyn retrieves the bottle and fills his goblet anew. “She sought justice, not vengeance.”

            “And yet she got both.” Enruhl, leaving his cousin’s side, takes his place at the window. Watching the shadows dance across his reflected face, the deposed lord finds a grim satisfaction in the darkness. It lends to his face an emptiness that matches his heart, and he digs deeper into that pain. “It was adventurers.”

            Klabert has been expecting this, and he is hesitant to be supportive of his cousin’s anguish given the great services adventurers have paid the Free Lands this past year, his household in particular.

            “She left him hope. She let him think she would exile him…Furyondy most likely.” The silence races to fill the void left as Enruhl inebriatedly follows the stray thought. “It was they,” he says finally, “that sealed his fate. They denounced him.”

            “Not all of them.”

            “Two feebly offered protests against four resolute indictments. They killed him! They killed my son.”

            Again, silence.

            “Ethane made his decision, Enruhl,” Klabert finally says firmly, “and it was a poor decision. Whatever good intentions you may have had inviting the Knights of Furyondy to remain at Westguard, Ehtane exploited those intentions for his own ends. His sentence is the price of peace.”

            “Peace? Is that all? Or will there be more? What is the price of peace?”

 

            The horse-drawn carriage arrives before the grand church of Rao in the besieged capital of Veluna, the Holy City of Mitrik. No footman opens the door. The teamsters do not leave their bench, but wait anxiously to depart with cargo unloaded. From within, a pale-white hand pushes the door open, and a man draped in thick black robes pours like ink onto the steps of the most holy site. Swinging about his neck is a silver holy symbol of the Calm God. Clutched in his other hand is second holy symbol, the cracked skull of the Old One. He eyes it through slitted eyes and then throws it uncaringly back into the carriage. He turns back to the steps, finally acknowledging the men standing there.

            “Canon, thank you for having me.”

            “I have spoken to Magister Hunter and she has told me you would aid us in our battle in exchange for sanctuary in an effort to prove your redemption. I have given my consent. Let us hope our trust is well placed.” The old priest opens his arms ceremoniously. “The Archclericy of Veluna and the faithful of the Mediator welcome you and grant you sanctuary, Vayne, Lord of Wands.”