Faith: From Dust, Et Cetera (Part 1)

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

Jared and Evelyn, exhausted from their journey, were ushered to separate rooms within the keep. There they slept, watched over by armed guards; the thick walls kept out the sounds of war and the smell of smoke. Their sleep was deep and long.

When they awoke, they were allowed some time for their toiletries, and then ushered through the palace by the guards assigned to them. They met each-other at the ornate doors of their destination; Evelyn necessarily held upright by the guard protecting her. After a smile and nod, the doors swung open, and they entered.

It was the same room as Jared had entered a month ago; the one in which the plans for the Expedition had been made. That time, the occupants had been three; the Prince of Ostek, his commander von Erik, and the Prince's niece Evelyn, who Jared was then meeting for the first time. Now there was but one, and the Prince's throne stood empty.

"...who are you?" Evelyn asked of the man sitting to the throne's right. "I know you're the soldier who greeted us last night, but I don't think I've ever been formally introduced."

At the same time, a look of concentration had come onto Jared's face; now he snapped his fingers and said, "I remember you! You're Robert. You're the man who recruited me into the Prince's service!"

"That I am," Robert agreed, tipping his chair backwards. "I'm sorry that I've not risen, Your Highness - " here meaning Evelyn " - but it's been a very long night, and a very long day before it, and I'm in no shape to stand. Would you care to sit?" he offered.

Jared and Evelyn did so. Evelyn looked at the empty throne with something indecipherable in her eyes; she chose to take a chair opposite it. Jared sat next to her, opposite Robert.

"I have a question," Jared began. "When we first met, you were a sergeant in the Prince's service. And now you're leading everything that's left?"

"You got it," Rob agreed, a bitter smirk twisting one corner of his mouth upwards. "There's a few guys with paper ranks higher than mine, but they're not saying anything. The fact is, when everything went wrong, I wasn't in the right place - that would've been hightailing it out of the damn city - but I wasn't in as wrong a place as everyone else. There's more to it than that, but I've got something of my own to ask, first."

"Which is?" Evelyn asked, politely.

"What happened to the expedition?" Robert asked. "I've got some idea - certainly the fact that only you two came back, and the severed heads the mercenary scum were carrying about -" (Evelyn blanched slightly at this) "- gave me some clue. But I'd like you to tell me the rest - the whole story, everything that happened from the time you left Ostek's gates to the time you came back."

They told him.

Robert was silent for a moment, afterwards. "I'm sorry about your injuries, Your Highness," he said to Evelyn. "You may not have known me before now, but I saw you, now and then. It - seems a cruel irony, for you, of all people, to be crippled thus - but I'm not helping," he interrupted himself, "And the damage is already healing. So enough said of that."

"Nothing more to say on anything we did or saw?" Evelyn asked.

"You went through a lot," Rob said. "You fought and bled and suffered for these last few weeks - but so have I, Your Highness, so have I. And I don't expect to live to see the moon rise in two days - so pardon me if my speculative tendencies are somewhat curbed."

"You still haven't told us your own half of the story," Jared prodded him. "What happened in Ostek while we were gone?"

Rob looked at him for a long moment. "Very well, then," he said. "I'll tell you. Now, I'm going to do this my way. I could just say, 'The enemy came, and a lot of good people died' - but I'm not going to. Because that would be an insult to everything those people were. And that's the last indiginity I'd want to inflict, right now, with how soon I expect to join them."

"Do we have time?" Evelyn asked. "We don't know how long until the invaders finish pillaging the city and move on to try their luck against the keep."

Rob's face was set like stone. "We have time," he told her. "We'll make time."

(To Be Continued)

Faith: Through the Ashes

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

Ostek burned.

"We were too late!" Evelyn cried as they crested the last hill before the city. They'd seen the smoke: rising from Ostek as it had from every last village and town they'd passed on the way. They'd hoped that it was from the surrounding fields, an attempt by the invaders to starve the city while the walls still held. Every settlement between Ostek and the mountains was in flames or in ashes; bodies littered the streets, left to rot where they fell. Fir, in all likelihood, had been spared only due to its remoteness and obscurity. But Ostek was larger, and guarded; and the burning of the settlements must have cost the invaders - the Beckoners' mercenary army - time.

Seeing Ostek burn, they knew that it hadn't been enough.

For a moment Evelyn despaired: "If we'd been faster," she muttered, "if I hadn't delayed us with my illness - if, if, if!..."

As she calmed herself, Jared peered toward the city. "Look at the keep," he suggested. "There's smoke rising from the rest of the city, but hardly any there. No more than you'd expect from cooking-fires and other normal sources."

Evelyn squinted as she tried to see what Jared was saying. "If we had a spy-glass, it would be easier to tell... but yet, I think you're right. Perhaps the keep still holds, somehow. If so, we must go there, see what can be salvaged. If the army is inside - lacking only leadership, perhaps - then the day may not yet be lost..."

It wasn't a good plan, but it was the best one they had. They considered implementation. "We can't go in through the city gates," Jared said, and Evelyn nodded, agreeing. "They'll be guarded by the enemy, and I doubt they'd let us through unmolested. Neither of us are in any shape for climbing city walls, either, so..." Evelyn seemed momentarily lost in thought.

"There's another way," she told Jared. "The keep that holds my father's palace is nestled against the city walls. Most traffic passes through the two gates between the keep and the city proper, but there is another gate - not a secret, just a pain to get to. It's up a very steep, zig-zagging slope, so it's useless for anything but foot-traffic, and a bother for that. Still, it's better than trying to sneak through a city filled with-" she winced "-a marauding mercenary army paid by genocidal maniacs."

"Yes, the rear gate's our best chance," Jared agreed. "If we can avoid enemy patrols..."

They encountered not a single living soul on their trek across the city plains to the keep's rear gate. Their unspoken surmise was that the enemy was too busy inside to care about any passers-by; a surmise backed by the smoke billowing skywards and the terrible clamour rising from within Ostek, a noise growing louder as Jared and Evelyn approached. For half an hour, the wind turned; a grey, ash-filled haze covered the two travelers, forcing them to use their (already somewhat redolent) clothing as masks. With the smoke came a dreadful charnel smell, making them use their blanket as a blinder for their horse which, with its more sensitive nose, took the smell even worse. Evelyn seemed near to tears several times, despite her improvised mask; Jared looked ready to join her, and not only for the ashes irritating his eyes, either. Mass death was something neither of them had learned to bear.

Nightfall neared by the time they reached the keep's gate. Jared had been forced to walk for half the long climb up the path for fear of tiring their horse. Evelyn, her legs still weak and prone to failure, was just as exhausted from the simpler effort of staying atop the horse. Neither was in good condition to face down the guards upon the gate, though the revelation that there still were guards loyal to the rightful rulers of Ostek lightened their spirits enormously. They argued until the sun passed over the horizon, trying to convince their interlocutors that they were who they claimed to be; the guards were themselves clearly dead-weary and afraid, in no state to leave their posts and approach Jared and Evelyn closely enough to see the truth for themselves.

Finally, the sally-port beside the main gate cracked open, and three men exited, two of them torch-bearing companions to the third. That last approached Evelyn and Jared, the latter leaning against the horse for support, and exclaimed in surprise. "Praise the Maker!" he cried. "It's you, it really is! Evelyn! Jared!" He rushed forward, abandoning the company of his guards, and embraced both. "We will take you in," he said, nearly babbling, "and tell you of the disaster that happened in your absence, and you will in turn tell us of the fate of the expedition. And then, then, then..." he sputtered out.

"And then you will flee," he told them, his tones empty of their previous manic energy, "For when the sun sets over the horizon two days from now, I have little doubt that the keep of Ostek will fall to the enemy, and I, along with the rest of her defenders, shall fall with it."

Faith: Travails

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

In the morning, Jared and Evelyn set off for Fir. Their progress was slow. The woods made travel difficult, as Evelyn had suggested, and Jared needed many breaks, exhausted by the work of carrying Evelyn. At the second of these breaks, the two travelers collaborated in crafting a sort of crude harness for Evelyn from cloth and broken branches, lightening Jared's load somewhat. Still, they moved not nearly so fast as a single traveler, unburdened, might have – and slower yet once their supply of meat (source left politically unnamed) was depleted on the second day. They ate nuts and berries instead, and grew steadily thinner.

On the third day, Evelyn descended into fever. Jared found a stream, and used its water to dampen Evelyn's brow. There was nothing more he could do before they reached shelter.

On the fifth day, desperate, Jared ate berries best left untouched. He spent the remainder of the daylight hours puking out his guts, caring for Evelyn whenever the heaving subsided.

On the sixth day, finally, they reached Fir.

The villagers were kind, as Jared had gambled they would be. They took Jared and Evelyn in, gave them food and shelter, cared for their wounds and illness with what medicine they had. Evelyn's fever faded and died; their ribs receded from prominence beneath the poor, but intact, clothes provided by the villagers. Miraculously – perhaps – sensation began to return to Evelyn's legs. Her attempts at walking failed, swiftly and repeatedly connecting her face with the ground. Still, she was healing, as she had desperately feared that she might never, as often happened with wounds of that sort.

Eight days after they arrived at Fir, Evelyn held a heated conversation with Jared across the kitchen table of the house at which they were staying.

“It's time to leave,” she told him. “It's been two weeks since the ambush in the pass. We have no idea what's happened in the city – with the Beckoner forces loose and my uncle... gone, anything could have happened. We need to get back and help my cousin, the heir, take control of the city.”

Jared shook his head. “No. We're not recovered.”

“We're recovered enough,” Evelyn told him. “I know that the red-hair – Jahn, that's his name – has a horse. Borrow it. Beg, plead, put that sword my uncle gave you in hock for it, promise him a dozen stallions in return – it doesn't matter. With it, we can both ride back to the city in half the time we took getting here.”

“You're still healing. We shouldn't leave until you can walk again,” Jared replied stubbornly.

“It doesn't matter,” Evelyn told him. “I can ride – that's the important thing. We need to act quickly, before the Beckoners strike.”

“What if riding aggravates your injury, cripples you for good? It's too much of a risk.”

“It doesn't seem likely. If I managed to get through the forest on your back without permanent injury, a little horseback jaunt won't stop me -” Evelyn paused and gave Jared a closer look. “But that's not the point, is it? You're looking for excuses – any reason to stay here, to give up. Why?”

Jared was silent.

“Is it that you think your loyalty to Ostek died when my uncle did? Think again. There's no better place in the world for you to be. It's a place where any man can gain the stature he deserves – von Erik showed that, if anyone did. In a time like this, you could become a very powerful man – and you'll need power, if you want to stop the Beckoners. They're moving quickly – if they're not stopped soon, I really do think they could succeed. They could set the world to utter chaos, burn the cities and the villages, kill everyone. Monstrous. Hideous. We have to stop it.”

“They spared my life,” Jared said abruptly.

“What?” Evelyn said, taken aback.

“In the pass. Everyone else who'd survived the rockslide, killed. Soldiers. von Erik. Your uncle. The Beckoners chopped their heads off and left the bodies for the crows. You only survived because you were buried. Same reason you can't walk. Mixed blessing.”

“But not me.”

“You didn't tell me this,” Evelyn said, half accusingly, half in shock.

“I didn't know what to make of it. Why wouldn't they kill me? Did they recognize me? Actual Beckoners in mercenary ranks, recognizing me from the village? And, why? Is it some message? A threat? Forgiveness? I didn't understand. I still don't.”

There was silence for a moment. Then, again, Evelyn spoke. “It doesn't matter,” she said. “The important thing is that you're still alive. The reasons that you left the Beckoners – they're still true, more than ever. The reasons that you decided to oppose them – they're still true, too. It doesn't matter. We just have to – move on.”

Silence followed again, for a time. Then Jared grunted, rising from his chair. “I'll talk to Jahn about the horse,” he told her.

Provisioning took more time; but preparations made and farewells said, Evelyn and Jered left for Ostek on the noon of the eighth day. As they set out, they could see black smoke, rising thickly just before the horizon.

Faith: From the Shadow of Death

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

When we left them...

Jared, exiled from his valley home in the mountains at the centre of the world, had found employ as a soldier in the service of the Prince of Ostek. Upon averting an assassination attempt upon the Prince's life – and subsequently identifying the assassin as having some connection with the Beckoners, Jared's former tribe – the Prince gave Jared new employment as a royal advisor. Jared related to the prince his story of the Beckoner plot: a scheme of worldwide genocide against all non-Beckoners, subterfuge in service of which was likely the cause of recent turmoil around Ostek and in nearby lands. Alarmed, but knowing that the Beckoners were few in number, the Prince ordered an expedition to find and crush the Beckoners in their home territory. Two full companies of the Prince's finest marched into the mountains, their trip uneventful until they crossed a long and narrow pass into the first of the many valleys between them and the Beckoners. In that first valley, the expedition stumbled upon a vast encampment of mercenaries, doubtless in service of the enemy. Electing to retreat, resupply, and try an alternate route, the expedition moved swiftly back down the pass from whence they had come – only to be all but annihilated by a sudden rockslide. Jared rose, terribly injured, only to find the others either crushed by rocks or – in the case of several soldiers and, notably, the Prince and his military commander – brutally beheaded. He found only one survivor, buried beneath a layer of boulders and sheltered by corpses – Evelyn, the Prince's niece...

Evelyn woke some time after nightfall. She was lying on the ground, in the middle of unfamiliar woods. The only person she could see was Jared, tending an unidentifiable chunk of meat on a skewer above a crackling fire. His clothes were ragged and torn, and any part of his flesh that was not bruised was cut or scraped – or all three. Despite this slightly gruesome sight, the smell of the meat made Evelyn's mouth water.

She couldn't move.

With a commendable calm, considering the cirumstances, Evelyn asked Jared, “Where am I?”

Jared looked up from the meat, surprised. “Oh. Don't know.”

Evelyn thought. She asked again. “Where are we going?”

“There's a village I know in the region, called Fir by the locals. Stayed there for a while about half a year ago, did some trapping, learned the language. They don't have many strangers there. Too remote. Thought we could rest there, heal before we traveled back to Ostek.”

“We could take the wagons,” Evelyn suggested. “It's probably slower going through the wood, even if Fir is closer-”

“Wagons were smashed,” Jared told her. “Horses are dead.” He gestured vaguely toward the spit.

Evelyn was confronted with three unpleasant questions. She paused, then spoke. “What happened?”

“Rockslide. Fell. Hit the expedition. Me, you. Everyone.”

“Natural or artificial?” Evelyn asked, her voice uneven.

“Artificial, I'd guess. Don't know. Don't know how they'd have gotten past us, either – we rode pretty fast out of the valley, and I don't know how anyone could have overtaken us off the pass, on the slopes.”

“Probably signals,” Evelyn suggested. “Some of the men saw lights at night, on the mountainsides. Probably the enemy lighting fires to warn sentries already in place we were coming.”

Jared offered a noncommittal grunt.

Again Evelyn paused before asking her next question. Uneasily: “Why can't I move?” She could lift her torso, awkwardly – though it hurt to move – but her lower body was covered by a rough brown blanket, and she couldn't seem to move her legs.

Jared, too, paused before giving speech. “Rockslide,” he said. “I found you buried. You got hurt pretty bad.”

“How did I get here?” Evelyn asked.

“I carried you,” Jared told her.

A third pause followed, the longest yet. Then Evelyn spoke, the words spilling out one after another with increasing speed: “Why didn't the others help? Where are the others?”

“In the pass,” Jared told her. His words came out slowly, filled with some unidentifiable emotion.

“Dead,” Evelyn whispered.

Jared could not have heard her over the sound of the fire. Still, he nodded.

“The men – all of them. von Erik. My – my uncle.”

Three times, Jared nodded.

For a time, neither said anything. Then, quietly, uncontrollably, Evelyn began to sob.

Jared comforted her, as best he could.

Eventually, they ate. Both devoured the meat voraciously, as though to spite their sorrows- Evelyn especially. She didn't ask where the meat had come from. She suspected the answer, or knew, as she had the other questions – and for a time, she had enough of answers.

[Note: This post was last edited two and a half months ago. Poor blag.]

Faith: On High

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

The expedition set forth four days later. There had been a delay; the Baronet von Erik had been sent forth with half the Prince's army to crush a small peasant uprising in the north. He returned a day later, triumphant, albeit bloodied by a peasant unusually skilled with a spear. A leech tended his wound, but it was minor, "barely a scratch"; so with Jared, Evelyn, the Prince, and two companies of Ostek soldiers, the Baronet traveled towards the mountains at the Heart of the World.

The journey was easy and short; the land between Ostek and the mountains was flat, though trails and settlements grew sparser as the expedition came closer to the Heart of the World. The Baronet estimated that they'd reach the nearest pass within ten days of their departure; after eight days of travel, they could see the pass, rising above them into the distant peaks.

That night, as the expedition's leadership sat around a fire, eating, Jared broached a question that he'd been wondering about ever since they set out. "Your Highness," he began (speaking to the Prince), "Why are you with us? You are the Prince of Ostek!"

The Prince responded quickly, but without anger. "This is essential to the future of my city," he told Jared. "The unrest and outright insurrections that have troubled Ostek increasingly already have begun to impoverish the people and drain valuable resources from the kingdom. If they continue - or, worse, intensify - Ostek will be in deadly danger of collapse. And here you present me with a means of identifying the source of the troubles and, at a stroke, destroying them? This attack will destroy the Beckoners and save Ostek, if all goes well - and I could not miss it if I wished to. It is my duty to be here, now."

In the morning, the Baronet von Erik approached Jared in private, speaking to him quietly and fiercely. "The Prince is a man of action," he explained to Jared. "When he sees that he should do something, he does it - bam! - like that. He saw that I was a good soldier, that I led my men well. Bam! He promoted me to Subcommander of the Royal Army - then, later, Commander and Baronet. The same with this, now - he saw a problem, and he acted to fix it. He is a great leader, I think - probably better than the Emperor of the West, who is old and degenerate maybe. He leads Ostek well, and even I, who have no loyalty to the city, follow him because of it. He does things right, and when he sees he has made a mistake, he corrects it, nearly always."

"You really believe in him," Jared said.

"I do," the Baronet agreed. "You should."

On the day before they entered the pass, a scout went missing. von Erik decided to delay their departure from camp, and sent other scouts out to search. But they returned by an hour past noon, with no sign of the missing rider; reluctantly, they marched onward, leaving the missing scout for dead. No signs were left in their camp to show where they had gone, lest others find them; the expedition was, despite its size, nominally secret, and no announcement had been made in Ostek proper of its destination, for fear of spies.

The pass was narrow and long; they arrived at it at midday, due to the previous day's delay, and still were more often in darkness than in light, as long shadows from the surrounding mountains covered them. Jared was nervous, as was most of the expedition; the land was barren, and every turn seemed a likely ambush location. Most of the soldiers, Jared noticed, kept a bow close to hand as they rode; Jared followed suit.

They made it out of the pass without any loss beyond a pack mule, which broke a leg and had to be killed. Just beyond, to their surprise and joy, was the missing scout, bruised and haggard but still alive. He had been pursued by heavily-armed bandits, he explained, and had lost his horse in the escape. Food and water were provided him, and the Prince and his niece interrogated him on his experience; they emerged certain that the "bandits" were mercenaries in Beckoner employ. Still, the mood in camp was optimistic that night.

From this point on, Jared knew (for it had been agreed earlier, in the planning stages) that it would be his responsibility to navigate to the Beckoner valley. In the short time before the expedition set out, the Prince's agents had been unable to find any reliable maps of the Heart of the World; Jared himself had traveled through them only in Thera's service and, later, in his exile, and was by neither particularly well-prepared to lead the expedition. Still, he knew the tongue of the land, assuming that non-Beckoner villages yet remained; he would ride at the head of the column, doing what he could.

On the morning after the expedition left the pass, Jared crested a low ridge, coming into view of the valley they'd entered. He cursed and ordered the column, "Back! Back!"

Horses came to a halt, men piled up, many cursing themselves. The Prince rode up, asking Jared, "What is it? What did you see?"

They approached the ridge on foot, the Baronet and Evelyn with them. Jared leading the way, they looked over the top carefully; and they saw what Jared had spotted with such trepidation. A vast camp filled the valley, smoking from a thousand camp-fires. Within walked men of all cut of armour, made tiny by distance; eating, sparring, talking. "Are these the Beckoners?" the Baronet asked, astonished. "There must be ten thousand of them - twice that, maybe, four times!"

Jared shook his head, his face grim. "Those are mercenaries."

They retreated to their horses, talking as they went. "Your leader let mercenaries into her land?" Evelyn asked. "I thought she was manipulating events indirectly, anonymously."

"I thought she was," Jared admitted. "I suppose it's more convenient for her to deal with them en masse, though she's probably still not speaking to them in person. Also - now that I think of it - few nations would welcome such any large gathering of mercenaries, but there's a lot of unused space in the Heart of the World, waiting to be put to Beckoner use."

"Do you think we can get past them, strike at the Beckoners as planned?" the Prince asked.

"I doubt it," Jared and von Erik said in unison. They exchanged smiles, and von Erik continued, "They certainly have scouts out - the Beckoners watching the mercenaries, and the mercenaries watching each-other. We'll have to go back, find another pass."

"Could we pass as a mercenary company?" Evelyn asked.

von Erik thought about it. "Maybe," he said. "We'd probably have to destroy the emblems, somehow get new uniform of some sort... my men are too disciplined and well equipped to easily pass for mercenaries" - this said with no little pride - "but if we had time to prepare, we might be able to infiltrate their camp."

"Do you think this is the only such camp?" Jared asked, suddenly; and this none of the others could answer.

The company circled, turned to depart. A lieutenant rode up to von Erik; the latter's face grew tense with fear. "Two scouts have vanished," he told the Prince, with Jared horseback nearby. "I fear the worse. I think it's time for us to make our exit."

The Prince agreed, nodding. The column began, unevenly, to move, back towards the pass it had traveled just a day before. von Erik rode up beside Jared, confiding in him for a moment. "I would have liked to go back for the missing men," he said. "Had I more men - or were the Prince not here - I would have risked it. But I haven't the manpower, and the risk is far too great. I only wish it were otherwise."

Jared nodded, feeling sick to his stomach. It was not a choice he would have ever liked to make.

Signs of pursuit became ever-clearer, as the long day went on. A rear scout reported back, quiver of arrows half-empty; he'd skirmished with a pair of mercenaries, wounding one and escaping injury himself. Another scout reported a large dust cloud, just over the horizon from where he rode.

The pass crossing was even more nerve-wracking, under such conditions. Night fell; still the expedition rode on, hoping to make it to the other side before dawn. von Erik had suggested sending the Prince and his niece ahead; both refused. The soldiers' morale, hearing this, rose noticably. Still, everyone seemed worried, on edge. Some reported seeing strange lights on the mountains, flickering dimly in the distance.

A sudden, rising rumbling noise was all the warning Jared had. He looked down first, slowing and trying to calm his horse and looking for signs of earth-quake; he thought to look up only too late. A shower of rocks and pebbles hit him, sending him reeling, clutching eyes and chest; then something larger hit him, and he fell screaming into oblivion, joined by a chorus of others.

Jared woke slowly, in agony. It took him several minutes to shake off a covering of scree and rise; every part of his body seemed to be bruised and lacerated. The land where the pass had been was covered in loose rocks; bodies lay beneath them, some concealed, others not.

It took Jared hours to walk through the entire disaster, from the rear (where he'd found himself, allowing his survival) to the head of the column. There, he found two bodies, close together; the Baronet von Erik and the Prince of Ostek. Both were headless; cleanly decapitated, by a blade, not a rock.

Filled with guilt and grief, knowing that he had led the Prince into this trap (unknowingly), Jared's eyes filled with tears.

Then he heard something odd. Still pained by his injuries, Jared began to dig nearby. He found dead horses, ignored them; found soldiers, bodies broken and necks slit; then found another. Hidden beneath another corpse, Evelyn lay covered in blood, her right leg pressed beneath a boulder. And, unlike anyone Jared had found since the disaster, Evelyn was still breathing.

Jared resolved to save her.

Faith: The Councils of the Mighty

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

Jared came to a halt before a pair of ornately carved doors, guarded by a pair of soldiers. The servant who had guided him through the maze-like palace halls hurried away. Jared had been ordered to a meeting with the Prince of Ostek, whose service he had entered and whose life he had saved; though still relatively new to civilized society, being born in the rural lands at the Heart of the World as he had been, he knew enough to respect and fear the Prince, for the power he represented. So he entered, handing his sword to the guards at the door as he went, the wooden doors swinging wide.

The Prince sat at a throne of black stone, at the head of a small table. He introduced Jared to the others as the latter sat at the only empty seat, opposite the Prince. "This is the commander of my army, the Baronet von Erich. He came here looking for pay, and earned a title for his deeds in my service," the Prince said of the grizzled-looking man to his right. Pointing to the young woman to his left, the Prince continued, "She is my niece and heir, Evelyn. Quick of mind and body - she can outrun a horse! She is here to learn from me how to rule a city." Evelyn blushed at the compliment, while the Prince turned to Jared. "Now. Tell me about the assassin."

"I don't know him," Jared protested. "I encountered him for the first time today."

"How did you know he was going to attack His Highness?" Evelyn asked.

"I'd noticed something odd about him - he was carrying a metal blade," Jared said, feeling uncertain of himself. "But I didn't know he was going to do anything until he did."

"And then you stopped him," Evelyn confirmed.

"Yes."

"You said that you'd recognized the coins he was carrying," the Prince of Ostek asked.

"Yes," Jared agreed. "They're Intaki coins. I'm a little bit surprised I'd recognized them; it's been years since I saw their like. But there's no mistaking them."

"I do not come from around here," the Baronet von Erich said. "I was born in the Holy Empire, of the West, and came here as a mercenary only a few years ago. So I must ask: Why is it so strange that coins of a people from the Heart of the World should be found?"

Jared waited a moment; then, realizing it was his responsibility to explain, spoke. "The Heart of the World is very isolated; almost no-one enters or leaves, except once every generation or two, when a group fleeing outside oppression enters to find sanctuary. Even within, there's very little communication or trade: valleys are like little worlds. I never ventured out of my own valley for over fifteen years, until I joined the army. The same was true of almost everyone in my village."

"And yet the Intaki coins were in the assassin's purse," the Baronet mused. "And so are you, though you say that there's no contact between the Heart of the World and civilized lands. And you say you joined an army. What use is an army in a completely isolated valley?"

Jared said nothing, looking pained. He'd rather hoped to leave the Beckoners behind, after his exile; but now they'd come back to haunt him.

"Well?" the Prince asked. "These are, I think, the questions for which I asked you here."

"It's really one question," Jared began. "And it's best answered with a story."

The Prince nodded. "Begin."

"I grew up among the Beckoners. We believed - ah, something like - 'the end-times have already come, and it is the duty of the faithful to help it along.' That is, er, to kill everyone. We hadn't done anything about it in a long time - we just believed that the time would come, when our strength was great enough. But that changed, very suddenly. A girl I knew - older than me - forged an alliance with a nearby tribe and began a war against all the other tribes. Not all at once - one at a time, exploiting their isolation. She was - is - a genius, a military genius. The Intaki were one of the first tribes to fall at her hands. I joined the army, but was disgusted at the atrocities that were committed. So I left - I was exiled. And, eventually, came here."

Jared stopped. Evelyn was looking at him pityingly. The other two had considering expressions - perhaps wondering how much of Jared's story was accurate. Jared knew they were right to wonder - he had truncated the story to his own benefit, leaving out the details of his relationship with Thera.

The Prince asked the next question. "So what of the Intaki coins? You still haven't told us why they're here."

Jared thought for a moment, then spoke carefully. "I'd... heard, before I was exiled, that the war would continue otherwise... ah, sorry, that was badly said. When I was exiled, we - the Beckoners - had conquered much of the Heart of the World. We expected that we'd have it all within years. When that happened, we'd continue the campaign, fighting out of the mountains. But our leader, the girl, wasn't stupid enough to think that our tiny numbers would match the legions of the world beyond. Our entire village would fit within one of your marketplaces! So we planned to continue by spying. I don't know exactly how, but this assassin, holding Intaki coin, seems like he's probably involved."

"Is he from the mountains?" Evelyn asked.

Jared shook his head. "He's no Beckoner. If he were, I'd have recognized him. He might be from another part of the mountains, but it's not really in our creed to recruit outsiders. It would make more sense for us to hire a mercenary from Outside, if we were going to do so."

"And you think that's what they're doing?" the Baronet asked.

The Prince answered. "It makes sense. If what the young man said is true, then a lot of things start to come together - the bandits flocking everywhere, rebels popping up in every village... not only in my lands, but in other kingdoms as well, from what I've heard. The Beckoners must be funding them. I wouldn't normally be so quick to believe him - but the assassin is the proof."

"So what shall we do about them, Your Highness?" the Baronet von Erich asked.

"From what he's said, there are only a pittance of Beckoners, exerting influence beyond their numbers by using their wealth cleverly. No match for armed force."

"Shall I put together a company for an expedition?" asked the Baronet, grinning.

"Make it two," said the Prince after a moment's consideration. Explaining to Evelyn and Jared, he continued, "We're going to cut off all the recent troubles at the root, by marching into the Heart of the World, in - say, three days. And you're coming."

He thought for a moment. "You don't have any trouble fighting your own people, do you?" he asked Jared.

Jared frowned. He was full of trepidation on a number of counts - fear of Thera, concern over the course of action that he suddenly found himself committed to, and reluctance to, as the Prince of Ostek had phrased it, "fight his own people." Still, he answered truthfully when he replied, "No, Your Highness. I left when I discovered the, well, evil they were doing - and if they want to bring it outside the mountains, I will fight them."

"Good," the Prince said, already rising. Jared hastily followed suit, walking with the other two to the door.

The guards returned Jared his sword, which caught the Prince's attention. "Is that the best you have?" he said critically, looking Jared up and down as he said so.

Jared flushed. "Yes, your Highness," he replied. "I apologize-"

The Prince shook his head. "Don't bother," he cut Jared off. "I'll have the steward get you something better. Some chain-mail, perhaps, and a replacement for that dinged-up piece of iron junk you're using."

Jared let the guard take his sword, the sword his parents had given him, saying only "Thank you, Your Highness." His heart was filled with uncertainty, but in this, as the rest, he felt carried away by circumstance.

Preparations for the expedition to the Heart of the World began.

Faith: The Hierarchy

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

Jared moaned wearily as he rose to consciousness. Someone was shaking him. "Whaddyou want?" he asked groggily.

"Ceremony tomorrow," the mysterious awakener told him, unseen in the darkness of the barracks in which Jared slept. "Hour after dawn. Supposed to be a surprise This junk the best set of clothes you have?"

"Yeah," Jared said, eyes only half-open.

"Get something decent. Fit for seeing the Prince," the unseen interlocutor told Jared, and moved away.

Jared rolled over and went back to sleep.

Six hours later, in a borrowed set of dress clothes, he stood in line, one of perhaps two hundred other soldiers present. They were, Jared had gathered, recent recruits into the Prince's army, now being formally sworn to his service en-masse. To Jared's right was a woman from his unit, recruited about two weeks before Jared. To his left was another foreigner, clearly so by his skin tone and accent. Jared tried to make small talk with him, but was repelled by his prickly attitute, and so turned to speak exclusively with the woman he knew.

Something about the man to Jared's left was bothering him; but he didn't figure out what before the Prince appeared. He was a thin man, perhaps ten years older than Jared (though his upper-class upbringing made him seem younger than he really was), regally dressed in ermine and silk. He gave a short speech, setting out the woes of the times, praising those who now served to defend the city-state of Ostek; then he began pacing the rows, administering individual oaths.

Jared figured out what was bothering him. He'd been issued a ceremonial, wooden sword for the occasion, as the Prince preferred not to be in a crowd of strangers with real swords; but judging by the hilt of the soldier to his left, the foreigner, he was carrying a real weapon, one that had seen action. That was odd. Why was he carrying that?

The Prince neared.

Jared nudged the foreigner, asked him about the sword. The man scowled and refused to answer. Jared became, if anything, even more curious - but he had to stop speaking. The Prince was close by, two rows away-

Jared saw a glint of metal to his left, and looked, and saw the foreigner with a loaded miniature crossbow in his hand, and acted-

the assassin's shot went wide as Jared knocked into him, grabbing for the sword in his sheath-

for moments, as they wrestled, no-one seemed to notice, and Jared had no breath to spare for a cry for help-

Jared seized the sword, got a blow to his injured side that reopened the wound and sent him sprawling in pain-

the assassin attacked Jared, focused on trying to kill him, and the sword in Jared's hand came up lightning-quick and opened his throat-

and suddenly there was noise everywhere, soldiers were running to and fro, bodyguards appeared around the Prince, the assassin was bleeding on the ground, and Jared could feel a dampness spread down his side as blood from the reopened arrow-wound soaked his borrowed formal clothes.

The Prince appeared next to Jared, looking at the assassin - who had, perhaps regrettably, become a corpse in the short intervening time. Jared did his best to explain what happened while someone else shredded the remnant of his shirt to bind his wound with.

"But who is the man?" the Prince asked, exasperated and a little bit afraid. "He's not some lunatic - that weapon of his speaks of money. Who would pay that much to have me dead?"

The assassin's body was searched, contents splayed around him. And in the mess, Jared spotted something that he recognized.

"There, your Highness" he said, somewhat hesitantly pointing. "Those coins. They're all old and foreign. But those three - the copper ones, sort of six-sided. I recognize those. They're from a place I've been, near my hometown."

"What's so odd about that?" the Prince asked.

"My hometown is in the Center of the World," Jared told him.

"Oh," said the Prince - knowing, as Jared did, just how little trade (or any contact) went between the mountains and valleys of the Center of the World and the World Outside.

The Prince stood for a moment, thinking. Then he snapped his fingers. "You," he said, pointing to Jared. "You're my new advisor. You've already shown initiative and skill. And you know something about whoever's trying to kill me."

Jared, somewhat shocked, agreed, "Yes, but-"

The Prince ignored him. "I'll expect you just after noon. The castle seneschal will tell you where to go. Come prepared."

Jared was left standing, slack-jawed, as the Prince walked away, talking urgently with a new arrival. The assassin's body was carted away.

"So, looks like you're moving up in life," the soldier Jared knew told him, tone lighthearted. "Figure our beloved Prince remembers he never actually swore you in?"

It was not, Jared thought, the first thing on his mind.

Faith: Out of Exile

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

When Jared first arrived in the city of Ostek, he was hungry, cold, and tired. Furthermore, it was night, and the streets were nearly empty. So he made his way to an inn, paid for a meal and a night's sleep, and consumed both.

It was only when he woke that he realized the full extent of the city he had entered. From his room's window alone, he could see more people walking along the street than lived in the whole of the Beckoner village, at the time of his youth. It was the largest city he'd ever been in, a dozen times larger than the biggest town he'd passed through in his exile.

Jared whistled, impressed, then went downstairs to break his fast.

Some time later, fairly full, he left the inn, maneuvering carefully in the busy, crowded, rather smelly streets. He didn't quite know where to go, so he followed the flow of traffic, which, meanderingly, led him to a street market, filled with merchants and customers haggling over goods. Pleasant smells lifted from spice stalls, pushing back the reek of sewage and unwashed bodies that dominated most of the city air.

Walking among the stalls, seeing the prices paid even for fresh fruit and meat, Jared considered the current contents of his pockets, and decided that, perhaps, it was time to seek formal employment.

Jared's first choice was to look for caravans, to hire on as a guard. He still had his iron sword, a gift from his parents when he came of age. It was now somewhat dinged and battered, but his skill with it had, if anything, grown over his years of travel, leaving the valleys of the center of the world, traveling to a series of villages and small towns outside, fighting beasts and bandits on a regular basis. (He had considered taking up the latter trade on his own, but his conscience rejected it, despite his empty stomach's urgings.) His skill at arms had distinguished him in the Beckoner army; surely, Jared thought, it would be enough to earn handsome pay here, in the infidel kingdoms of the world Outside.

It was not to be.

Jared found two caravan leaders, one planning to leave the next day, the other sometime in the next week. Both refused to employ him: his accent was thick, his appearance unpleasant (clothes worn, hair tangled), and he had no experience at all as a caravan guard. "Go away," they told him. "We have as many guards as we need." Jared approached individual merchants next, and had no better luck. Dejected, he moved away from the caravan gathering area where he had made his last attempt, and considered taking a menial job. He had been very hungry, in the wilderness, and the improvement in his conditions (and finances) that accompanied his trade in meat and furs with rural villages had been scant indeed. Jared had lived that life when it was necessary; but he would prefer not to do so again.

As Jared left the meeting area, he felt a touch on his back. He whirled, half-drawing his sword, expecting to see a youthful (and incompetent) pick-pocket behind him; but instead he found a dark-complexioned man standing there, one hand upraised, the other on the hilt of his own sword. "Good reflexes," the man praised Jared.

Jared looked at the man, surprised. "Why do you approach me?" he asked.

"The name's Robert," the man told him. "I'm a recruiter for the Prince's army. Times are tough, and getting tougher; bandits popping up like weeds, rebel armies gathering in every city. You look like you know what you're doing with a blade."

Jared nodded, still confused. "I'm sorry, I'm not very good with this language. Was that an implication..."

"I'm offering to recruit you into the army of the Prince."

"What's the pay and duties?"

"Ten copper a week, twice that if you stay on for a full year. You'll probably be part of the Fifth, in a small unit sent to fight bandits and thieves."

Jared considered, then nodded. "Done."

"Go to the barracks at the corner of Cooper's Street and the Royal Avenue," Robert directed him. "Tell them I sent you."

Jared was very amused, two days later, when he found that his first duty was to, in a unit with more experienced soldiers, escort a caravan, in the hopes of using it as bandit-bait. The caravan-master pretended not to recognize Jared when he joined the caravan, along with the other soldiers; but he offered a belated apology after Jared proved himself in combat, fighting bandits who struck on the day before the caravan was to finish its journey by returning to Ostek.
Jared accepted the apology, lying bandaged in a wagon in the rear of the caravan. An arrow had struck him in the heat of combat, putting a nasty slash down his side, though thankfully missing anything vital. As the caravan rolled through Ostek's gates, after two months travelling to and trading with distant towns, and one day after the bandit attack, Jared considered, his wound already healing quickly, life as a soldier for the Prince might not be so bad. Then he sniffed, and as the smell of Ostek washed over him, he amended that with, if I can get out of the city again soon.

Faith: Anathema

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

Jared looked up as hoofbeats rose behind him. Thera appeared to his right, held high above him on her riding ass. Jared sighed, and looked down as he trudged onward. The Beckoner village was in sight now, just a few hundred yards away.

Thera spoke, breaking the silence. "Don't do this," she said, as she had each day since she'd caught up to Jared after his precipitous departure from the Beckoner camp. "The Cause has need of you. Now, and in the years to come, after our victory. Don't throw yourself away for this futile gesture."

Today, in sight of his goal, Jared answered. "I have to," Jared said, anguished. "I believed in you, in the Cause. I had faith! And you slaughtered friends and employed monsters without apology."

"I only do that which is necessary for the Cause," Thera said. "The Jhozhur were killed for our own safety. They were a threat to the cause, once they - they - decided they'd had enough of war and ended our campaign, our alliance."

"And how do you justify Lar?" Jared stubbornly asked.

"Lar is a tool. That is all. He serves the Cause well. If he even once trespasses against us, he will die. But we are few in number, Jared. Very few, compared to the world of enemies lurking beyond our valley. I need every tool I can get."

"Is this supposed to persuade me?" Jared asked, indignant.

"It's the truth," Thera told him.

"No. It's your truth. I saw that after I spoke to you about Lar before, after I saw the heaps of the dead. It is your will that shapes this campaign, your vision of the Cause. When the Interpreters replace you as War-Leader, that will stop."

"They won't," Thera told him, impassively.

They didn't.

Jared and Thera met once more, afterwards, outside the village. Jared sat on a boulder, thinking. Thera rode up to him; Jared watched her approach. She stopped just before the boulder, meeting Jared face-to-face.

"They exiled me," Jared told her. "Declared me anathema, expelled me from the service of the Cause, gave me the mark of death should I ever enter Beckoner lands after this week."

"My parents refused to see me."

"I talked to the Interpreters, afterward," Thera told Jared. "Kept them from setting the dogs after you."

"I've lost everything," Jared mused. "My parents. The Cause. You. And now, I don't have anything to believe in. Anything at all."

Thera looked at him sympathetically. "You've made a great mistake," she told him. "But you still have another chance. We've already cleansed, by my best guess, about half the tribes in this land. We're getting better and faster with each one. Within five years, we'll have cleansed the every valley held within these mountains, and will move on to the world Outside. When we do, we'll need agents out there, serving the Cause through subtler means."

"I've been forbidden from serving the Cause," Jared reminded Thera.

"The Interpreters are no longer important," Thera said disdainfully. "They're feeble, impotent. They'll do whatever I tell them to. What matters is that you are sworn to me."

Jared sat for a long moment, thinking. Then, slowly but with increasing vigor, he shook his head.

"No," he said. "I've had enough of that. I won't serve the Cause, or you. I can't. I don't know what I will do, but I just can't believe any more in any cause so ruthless as yours."

"And your oath?" Thera prompted near-tonelessly.

Grimacing, Jared said, "I forsake my oath. No longer will I serve you, Thera."

Thera waited a moment, speechless, motionless, seemingly waiting for something. Then, quickly, she turned her mount and sent it trotting back down the valley, back to the village.

Jared watched her for a moment, then turned and began to walk into exile. He didn't look back.

For some years, he will wander in the wilderness - in valleys not yet touched by Thera's hand (and hostile to strangers), in barren wilderness, and, at last, into the world Outside. He will age, become tougher, perhaps wiser. He will be lost to history, for a time.

It is when he returns to the stage of history that our tale resumes.

Faith: The Fatted Calf

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, first post here.)

Jared shielded his face with his hand as he walked through the haphazardly erected tents of the Beckoner army. A stiff wind fluttered tent flaps and tugged at his backpack, chilling every unprotected inch of grimy flesh.

Smiling wearily, Jared entered the large tent at the center of the Beckoner camp - Thera's tent. A fire burned near the center of the capacious shelter, warming the soldiers who stood around it, chatting. A few were just there to get out of the cold; others were waiting to meet with Thera, whose office occupied the far half of the tent, separated from the waiting area by a thick flap. Jared smiled and waved at the soldiers and moved past them, slinging his backpack down as he went. He informed the guard at the divider of his need to see Thera, then turned back to join the other soldiers, hoping to thaw his hands out over the fire.

As he turned, Jared heard muffled speech behind him. The guard told him: "Wait." Jared obliged, surprised, and was informed momentarily that Thera would see him immediately. Looking at the waiting soldiers, Jared shrugged, and slipped through the inner divider to Thera's office.

The space was austere. Papers were stacked in boxes on the ground; more were on the desk at which Thera sat, too heavy to take on the march, and so probably looted from the latest Beckoner conquest, the village Jared had seen burning as he entered the valley. A small cot lay in the back of the room; Thera's office doubled as her bedroom. The only thing in it which showed no obvious utility was a small, half-filled box near the cot, holding, seemingly, only knick-knacks. Jared dismissed it from his mind and turned to Thera.

She rose, smiling, as Jared entered. "I'm glad to see you alive and well," she told him. "I didn't think the rabble you were fighting could threaten your health or life, but disease or accident can strike anywhere."

"I-I'm happy to see you too," Jared stammered, suddenly awkward in the presence of the General; nearly a peer, but grown to heights far beyond him. "Where are the Jhozhur, our allies? I didn't see their tents as I walked in."

"The Jhozhur are no longer part of our campaign," Thera told him. Still smiling, she asked, "But why are you back so soon - little more than a month after I sent you? Have you managed to quash the nuisance, the Intaki rabble?"

Jared's smile left his face. "It's the man you sent me with. Lar."

"What about him?" If he's insubordinate, I'm sorry, but that's a matter between you and him. Unless there's been some sort of mutiny, you can order him imprisoned, if it's become so dire."

"I did."

"Then..."

"He's a monster. He lured them in, kidnapped their children without orders, lied and claimed nothing happened on his patrols when he reported to me. I don't know where he kept them, or how. But I never knew."

"The Intaki came to rescue their children. At night, when I was sleeping. Lar ordered half the night watch - in my name! - to surround the hostages, guard them. He sent the other half to track the rescuers' trail back to their lair and slaughter them."

"He tortured the children, Thera. He cut them apart while their parents, their grandparents - and my men - watched. Then he killed the rest."

"One of the night watch - the ones assigned to guard the hostages while Lar did his filthy work - finally woke me. I looked at what was left, then ordered Lar held and set out for you."

"I don't have the authority," Jared stated, "to have him killed."

Thera thought, her face solemn. Her hands shuffled papers unthinkingly, as Jared watched with increasing concern. "Is there a problem?" he asked. "Should I have sent one of my command instead-?"

"No," said Thera, cutting him off. "I'm considering the example this would set. Yes, he circumvented the chain of command. That must be cut out at the root. I do not have a professional army, and I must exert every effort to maintain discipline. But he achieved quite spectacular results - tricking the Intaki into their own, final destruction. That deserves commendation."

"No," Thera said to an increasingly horrified Jared, "Lar has done well for the Cause. I will put him under my own direct command, keep him as an advisor. In this way, I will gain his valuable tactical insight, and be certain to control his more... willful tendencies."

"You're promoting him?" Jared asked, outraged. "But - he tortured children! He - I went into his tent, to arrest him - he'd taken some of the corpses. Some of the less... damaged ones. And in there, in his tent -"

"I'm sorry," Thera said with an apologetic look in her eyes, "But I don't care. He's done nothing to harm the Cause, and he's helped quite markedly with very limited resources. I don't care what he does, other than that. I would employ the Nine Devil Kings themselves, should they present themselves to my tent, if they served my purposes. And if they didn't - if Lar doesn't - then they'll go to their just end a little sooner than the rest of us."

Jared opened his mouth to vent an outburst.

"Stop," Thera said, interrupting him for the third time. "I can tell you're on the verge of insubordination. So take a walk. Cool down. When you return, we'll finish this, and I'll decide where you'll go next."

Jared closed his mouth, opened it again. Then, wordlessly, he turned and ducked under the tent's dividing flap, walking past the other soldiers and out into the bitterly cold wind. He stood there for a moment, just outside, his shoulders hunched. He wasn't sure what to think.

Then the wind shifted for a moment, blowing smoke from the burning village towards Jared. He covered his nose and mouth, coughing; then, struck by a thought, he uncovered them, taking a deep, unpleasant breath.

The smell of burning meat was on the air - and considering the direction, Jared doubted it was tonight's dinner.

Filled with a dreadful, sourceless apprehension, Jared began to walk towards the burning village. Most of the huts were ashes by now; the rest were merely smoldering. The smoke came from something else. Burning piles; large, lumpy piles, scattered between the burned huts. Piles,
Jared realized as he neared them, of bodies.

Covering his nose and mouth with his shirt, he walked between the piles, staring. Some of the corpses were dismembered, beheaded, burning in pieces; but most were nearly intact, killed by stab wounds, head trauma, shock. They burned slowly, reluctantly, some of them seeming almost alive as they burned.

Jared recognized one, with a shock. He was near the bottom of the pile, and nearly intact; the flame had done no more than remove most of his hair, and now it nibbled at his face. So Jared knew him: Isaac, the Jhozhur boy-warrior, with whom Jared had formed a friendship while they marched to war.

Jared put the pieces together, and realized where the Jhozhur were, and what he needed to do.

This was supposed to be another relatively-short part of Faith's story arc - to prevent authorial fatigue, I'd write up only the key events, cutting to the heart of things, and generally keeping it short.

I started writing it in class, and realized it wasn't very short at all.

No regrets!

Faith: Shadow of the Valley

(Part of a continuing series. Previous post here, last post here.)

Jared sighed, leaning over a map. He felt very weary. Some of it was physical; he'd spent much of the day on patrol with his men, many of whom were older than him, searching for Intaki survivors. Most of the time, he found nothing. Most of those remaining weren't warriors - just scattered noncombatants, left over from the destruction of the better part of their tribe in Thera's first victory.

The problem was that they were causing trouble - raiding for food, burning small buildings, poisoning wells. The small garrison sent to the valley had been unable to deal with them. So Jared was sent to command the post, in the hopes that his talents might be better applied to unconventional warfare than the pitched battles (and massacres) of the main Beckoner force.

Some of the soldiers grumbled about having a boy set over them- favored, they said, because he was Sworn years ago to Thera. Jared asked nothing of them that he would not do himself, though, and while he might be favoured by their commander, he did display a talent for tactics and arms. Within two weeks time, those under his command had largely ceased complaining - no more than most soldiers do, at any rate.

A rustling announced a visitor to Jared's hut. "Enter," he said, not looking up. He knew who it was.

"Your plan isn't working. Sir," said the visitor.

"You can't say that, Lar," Jared said. "I've only been trying it for a week. In that time, we've had two converts. That's more than anyone has gotten anywhere else."

"One of those converts has run for the hills since," Lar said dubiously, "And the other one doesn't look too steady on the faith. And while we tried to get converts with a show of food and declaration of mercy, we've lost a full pantry to thieves. And Jena got a wound to the shoulder that looks to be festering."

"I didn't know it had gone bad," Jared said.

There was a silence.

"Look-" Lar broke out.

"No." Jared told him. "We keep trying my plan. These people are starving. There are too many of them and very little food. If we control the food, we can control them. And once we have them, we can convert them to the true faith, and the problem will be solved without killing."

"I know your views on killing women and children," Lar sneered. "But how does that fit with your starving them to death? What if they die, Jared? What if they die?"

Jared grimaced. "I don't like it. But that'll... that'll be their choice. Not our fault."

"A mighty thin line," Lar said, following it with a tardy 'sir'. "Frankly, I say they've already made their choice," he continued. "They're not Beckoners now, they'll never be Beckoners... not really. Let's just kill 'em now, put 'em out of their suffering. It's the merciful thing to do. And you know how strongly I feel about mercy."

"I do," Jared agreed. "I've only known you since Thera sent you with me to guide me to the valley, and already I know your idea of 'mercy' far better than I ever want to. Get out of here," he gestured, momentarily animated. "Out! In the morning, we'll continue the patrols."

Jared rubbed his eyes; then he blew out the candle beside him and rolled over. "It's not that bad," he told himself. "Everything will look better by morning's light. And no matter what - I won't rely on Lar's mercy."

Faith: Marching On

Jared, younger than Thera, had been too young to join her when she began her Genocide Campaigns, despite the oath he swore to her with the other children when her plan was first born. But over a year passed from her first campaign to the second, and the second to the third; and when he, eagerly, asked to join for the third campaign, filled with dreams of glory and religious righteousness (not unaffected by the case of idol-worship he had for Thera herself), his request was granted; and so, as a youth still, he joined the army of the Beckoners (smaller than when it began, but much more experienced and better equipped), and set out to war.

The Jhozhur were the allies of the Beckoners for this campaign, lured by treasure and promises of more, as the Isostats had been before them. They were larger in number than the Beckoners, but worse trained; still Jared noted that the Beckoners made no effort to rectify this, and rather stayed in their own camp, rarely mingling as they marched to the valley of the foe. The distance between them was somewhat created by choice, but also by the difference in dialect between the tribes; the Jhozhur lived far from the Beckoners, and they had never met before Thera's campaigns brought them in contact. Still Jared was young, and curious; so one night, after a long day's march, he walked the distance between the camps and tried to make conversation with the Jhozhur tribesmen.

Jared felt awkward, not sure how to communicate with these outsiders; but one boy, scarcely older than Jared himself, spotted the bread Jared had thoughtlessly taken with him from the Beckoner camp, and in asking Jared for it provided an opportunity for conversation. Jared broke bread with the boy, whose name (he learned) was Isaac, and talked eagerly about a dozen things: people, places, animals, where they were going, what war was like. Isaac was surprised to find that Jared had not yet fought, and asked him about what battles his people had been in before, about which the Jhozhur knew next to nothing. Jared, though, felt strangely reluctant to speak of it, and changed the subject. They talked for hours before they grew too tired and retired to prepare themselves for the next day's march; still they formed a good impression of one another, and met again in following nights to talk and joke.

On the fifth day after the armies joined together to march on the foe, Jared awoke to find the camp abuzz. Thera's sentries had found an enemy fortification, guarding the pass into their valley. Thera had considered the matter, then launched a night raid, burning the fort and slaughtering the defenders. As the combined armies marched into the valley, Jared saw the smoldering ruins of the fort to the left of the line of march; the heads of their defenders now adorned pikes. Jared shivered; then he consoled himself, thinking, This is not true war. I will see the real thing soon enough.

Battle was joined the next day.

The Beckoners took the right flank; the Jhozhur were in the left and centre. They charged, yelling, at the enemy ranks (alerted by the smoke from the burning fort). The Beckoners followed more leisurely, loosing bow- and javelin-shot as they went. The foe was broken, inevitably, as any enemy that faced Thera was. Seeing the results, the Jhozhur made no complaints of tactics, despite their casualties, over twice those of the Beckoners'.

Jared was exhilarated during the battle; alternately terrified and filled with the urge to charge forward and aid the Jhozhur. The more experienced Beckoner warriors at his side held him back; and indeed, he saw hard fighting soon enough, as the Beckoners hit the enemy's flank. Jared's training kept him alive, and foes fell to his blade, mostly fleeing as their forces disintegrated.

Still doubting, Jared calmed himself with religion.

Then came the slaughter of the remaining villagers; and though he'd heard of it, Jared was appalled. He rose his weapons; then dropped them, ignoring the shouts of the Beckoners beside him. He could not bring himself to kill unarmed children.

Thera herself called Jared to her tent. “You swore an oath to me,” she reminded him.

Jared looked down, ashamed. “I know,” he said. “I tried – but I can't. I just can't... butcher people like that.”

“How is it different from the battle earlier?” Thera asked. “In the end, they're all destined for Salvation. We're speeding them along the way.”

Tongue-tied, Jared shook his head. “I don't know,” he said, humiliated. “I don't know.”

Thera thought for a moment, her face expressionless. "Are you still committed to the Cause?" she asked, no particular curiosity audible in her voice.

Jared nodded emphatically. "I will always be," he swore.

"Then," Thera said, "There is another place that could use your talents."

Faith: A Hymn to Battle

The better part of the Beckoner tribe traveled to battle that day; only the younger children, along with a very few men and women serving as guards, were left at the village. The Sindahar seemed to have done likewise; certainly their numbers were roughly equal to the Beckoners, if not slightly greater. They were a force of hundreds; and, as such, difficult to lead quietly. Thera, leading them to attack the Intaki, had not considered this previously; but even as she watched the dust rise from their massed numbers, she dismissed any concern she felt over it. Outnumbering the Intaki as they surely did, what concern need she have over stealth?

When the Beckoners and Sindahar arrived, Thera found she had been right. Only a scattering of Intaki stood between the attackers and the Intaki village; they fought bravely, but did little damage, and were easily defeated. Some died; the rest fled, and an hour later, as the Beckoner-Sindahar force arrived at the Intaki village, they found the entire Intaki tribe there, waving the peace flag.

The Sindahar ringed the village as the Beckoners approached it. The Intaki leaders looked fearfully at Thera as she approached with the rest of the Beckoners behind; one shouted, "What terms do you demand?"

Thera waited to respond until she was within comfortable speaking distance. Then she drew her sword and beheaded him. Her followers, taking this as their signal, drew weapons and slew the Intaki nearest them. Trapped, unarmed, the Intaki stood not the slightest chance. Those trapped in the village died to the last.

Once the slaughter was over, the Sindahar moved in, eager to claim their share of the treasure.

"It was a great battle!" the Sindahar chieftain told Thera, grinning broadly. "We should have trusted you from the first. As a gesture of our tribes' newfound friendship, I will grant you six goats from my own private stockpile upon our return."

Thera smiled thinly and returned to supervising her followers. The chieftain stared after her, miffed, then went looking for treasure for himself.

The tribes left the Intaki valley two days later, having looted and butchered to the point of satiation. Greasy smoke turned the grass black beneath their feet; corpse-fires burned below. The Beckoners whispered, finding it a good omen; if any among the Sindahar felt otherwise, Thera never heard.

Thera devoted the next two weeks to rest and reaccounting; a time that swelled into two months as one minor issue led into another, keeping Thera perpetually busy. At last, sick to death of administrative trivia - arguments over goat-grazing, coveted wives, and coveted goats - she appointed Rob, one of her sworn followers, to deal with all such inconsequential affairs, then retreated into her cabin. She stayed there for two full days, leaving only to deal with bodily functions. On her emergence, she called for a messenger. "Go to the Sindahar chieftain," she told the messenger. "Tell him it is time for war once more."

This time the target was to be the Rocza tribe, a larger tribe, led by exiled royalty from some forgotten kingdom of the outside world. They were better prepared than the Intaki had been; sentries on their borders saw the Beckoner-Sindahar force coming, and armed and armoured themselves before battle. Descended from royalty they might have been, but they had none of the formal training or doctrine of royal armies; they fought individually, with no formal structure, and the only sign of their heritage was the precious metal armour some of them wore. That and one other artefact - a horn, its tone deep and dread, which blew as the battle begun, sending the Rocza tribesmen forth.

The tribes collided in a great, bloody muddle. There were no defined lines of battle; each tribesman fought on his own, and many times a Sindahar or Beckoner struck at an ally, thinking them friends. Still their numbers told; the Rocza fell back, then fled. When the Sindahar-Beckoner force arrived at the Rocza village, they found the remaining tribesmen there, waving the peace flag.

Events thereafter proceeded much the same as with the Intaki.

The night after the battle, the victors held a great banquet, well outside the Rocza village. Alcohol was in great supply, and guards were stationed throughout the area in the anticipation of drunken brawling.

Thera ate little, drank less. She approached the Sindahar chieftain; spoke to him, politely; asked him when he would be ready for the battle.

He declined. "I'm speaking for all of his," the chieftain told Thera, "when I say we've had enough of battle. Our stocks are full to bursting, and our bellies likewise. I just don't see anything to be gained by fighting any more - though I can think of some other things I'd prefer." Drunkenly, he leered.

Thera left the chieftain, wandered throughout the banquet, whispered discreetly to the Beckoner guards as well as certain others among her tribesmen.

In the early hours of the morning, the banquet was drawing to a close. Many of the Sindahar had gone to sleep, some of them simply falling on the ground next to the table at which they ate and drank, others returning to their tents. Some of the Beckoners had done likewise - though, oddly, far fewer. They taunted the Sindahar for it, claiming greater stamina and virility.

All ears turned when the Rocza horn sounded - deep and dolorous, like a requiem. The still-standing Sindahar turned to one another, wondering, distracted. When the Beckoner guards set upon them - having first disposed of the Sindahar guards at their sides - the Sindahar were caught dreadfully unprepared. Most died quickly - standing, sleeping, together in tents. A very few, briefly, managed to protect themselves - seizing arms, grouping together - but Beckoner tribesmen rushed them, and they fell. The Sindahar chieftain was not among them - he died in his tent, killed by a knife from the woman he was with when the horn blew.

Thera allowed three days for the Beckoners to deal with the loot and the dead; then they marched, to the valley of the Sindahar. The pyres behind them burned with Sindahar and Rocza stacked indiscriminately, one atop another.

And, for a time, that is what need be said of Thera, savior of her people, who some - though not yet - would name "soulless".

That which follows is not hers.

Faith: Glory, Glory

(Part three of an ongoing series. Parts 1 and 2.)

But despite Thera's words, there were delays yet. There were many tribes in the valleys around them, and Thera's tribe, the Beckoners, were not the largest among them. Thera had thought, filled with vim and vigour, she might simply lead her people to victory.

"Let us go!" she told her sworn youth, the day after she gained leadership. "We have youth, strength, and the Right behind us. We will crush our foes!"

Her followers looked reluctant.

"We'll do it if you order us, Thera," Rob, older than Thera, said after a moment. "But there's a lot of world and a lot of people in it, and I don't think we can kill them all. That's why we used to send out missionaries."

Thera sighed. "Yes. And they all came back without their heads." She waved her hand, dismissing the others. "I'll tell you when I decide on our next move." Jared smiled reassuringly at her as he left, and Thera waved back before returning to the desk she'd taken from the War-Leader, staring at the maps on it as though she was going to kill their inhabitants with her mind alone.

"Missionaries," she said to herself.

After a silent minute, she continued, "But we never get missionaries from other tribes. Hardly anyone visits at all, in fact. The most we get are..."

She sat up straight, transfixed. Slowly, as though afraid to let the idea escape, she whispered, "Emissaries."

Two days later, she met with her coterie of sworn youth once more. "I want two volunteers," she told them. "Willing to fight. We'll be leaving the village for two days - maybe more. No-one must say why."

Most of Thera's sworn volunteered. She chose two: "Robert. Sera." They ran to get their belongings, and Thera, her voice filled with surety, told the others, "This is the beginning. Remember it. You were here."



The tribe of the Sindahar lived one valley away from the Beckoners, to the southeast. They'd been there for longer than anyone remembered; some thought they might be the original inhabitants. It was before their chieftain that Thera, with her two companions, now appeared.

"We would have alliance with you," Thera said formally. "The Intaki, to the west, are weak, and their lands are filled with food and treasure. Let us attack them together, make an end to their tribe, and together profit from their passing."

"And what guarantee have we that you will not betray us?" the Sindahar chieftain asked.

"You will have our oath," Thera told him, "And we will fight at your side."

The chieftain shook his head. "No. It would take more than that. Much more." He gave the gesture to dismiss her.

Thera refused to move. "I will give you more," she promised.

Surprised, the Chieftain asked, "As much as it takes?"

Thera nodded.



On her return to her tribe, Thera was called to an audience with the Great Council.



"This is unacceptable!" the Interpreter shouted. The others of the Great Council, five old men and women, scowled with him. "You have promised everything to these barbarians, these sacreligious apostates! Ten goats, five-hundred old coin, and half a dozen of our children as hostages! And for what? To plan a senseless and unjustified attack on one of our oldest neighbours!"

Thera twitched, but that was her only response to the outburst. "I promised only what was necessary," she told the religious elders calmly and coldly. "The Sindahar would have taken everything we have for this alliance; as it is, I have gained it for only a part of our treasure, and gained a half-dozen hostages from them besides. And for the matter of the attack - is it not my responsibility, our Sacred Duty, to do just that - not once, but again and again, until the work is done?"

"It is not your role to say!" an Interpreter shouted. "You are but a child - how can you claim the right to lead us, without any qualification?"

Thera spoke. "I am in the right."

"Have you nothing else to say in your defense?" she was asked.

Thera did not.

"The agreement is annulled," the Interpreters declared. "The hostages will be returned, and you will be dismissed as soon as we find a suitable replacement. By tomorrow, at the latest. Then, we will find a suitable punishment for your insolence!"

Calmly, Thera walked out of the temple. The children gathered around her, while the other tribesmen looked on from a distance. "What will you do?" they asked. "We could hear them shouting from outside!"

Thera smiled, unperturbed by events. "Meet me tonight," she told them, and would say nothing more.


Three of the Interpreters vanished from their homes. The other two reassembled in council the next morning, hastily annulling their decision to strip Thera of her rank and ordering the goods and hostages to be collected to seal the agreement with the Sindahar. Thera had already gained certain allies in the tribe; adults older than she who thought that she led them well - some, already, who believed in her. At her advice, the remaining Interpreters appointed three of these to fill the missing slots in the Great Council. If they were worse religiously versed than most of their predecessor, it was not so much as to invite open comment. Not around Thera, at least.

Thera urging them ever onward, the Beckoners prepared themselves for battle. Old weapons were brought out of storage, new ones were quickly forged. Fathers taught their sons, mothers their daughters, how to hold a spear or fire a bow. Then, within a week's time, all was in readiness. The Sindhar and Beckoner armies met atop a ridge; they marched together to strike the Intaki. And Thera, not the old Sindhar chieftain, was at their head.

Faith: Revelations

In the house of her parents, Thera dreamed silently, motionless. Then she twitched; her eyes opened, and she bolted upright. "I have it!" she whispered fiercely. After a moment, she looked out the window, saw the darkness outside, and settled slowly back to sleep.

But she did not forget.

The next day found Thera circled by other children. She spoke passionately and quickly: "It has come time for the world to end. Everyone must die." The other youths nodded, and Thera continued without pausing. "They do not believe this; so we must convert who we can, kill the rest, and then kill ourselves to end it all." The children nodded again, this was nothing new to them. "Do you have anything new to say?" jeered one of the older boys, Rob, looking bored. "I wanna get back to the tackleball."

A muttering rose in the crowd, and Thera instinctively knew that she was losing them; but another boy, Jared, younger than Thera, called out "Aw, Rob, don't be a half-bake. Let her finish. You know she's smarter than the rest of us."

The children's attention turned back to Thera, whose cheeks had coloured at the compliment. She smiled at Jared with thanks and resumed her speech with an even greater intensity. "So we've gotta kill everyone else. Yes, great, absolutely. But think about what'll happen then? We'll be all alone, the whole world all to ourselves. Who says we couldn't continue a little longer, then? All the nastiness comes from the other guys - the blind and the faithless who deny the Truth. Once we're the only ones left, things will be great - like Heaven, really! And once we're tired of things, we can just kill ourselves - there won't be any hurry."

Now she had their attention. Some of the children didn't understand, but most did, and those leaned in closer, fascinated by the notion. Thera clenched her fists in satisfaction.

Then another girl, less excited than the rest, asked skeptically, "But what's it matter anyway? We aren't ever really going to kill anyone. We're just living in this valley, and the most fighting any of us will ever do is in some sheep-raid gone wrong."

Thera scowled. "No! We will do it. I'll talk to the War-Leader, I'll show her what we have to do."

A boy laughed. "Like old Fussy-Warts would ever go more'n half a mile from her house, for fear her little baby would stub his toe."

Thera shook her head emphatically. "It doesn't matter! If she won't fight, then I'll take her post, and do the fighting myself. But I want you all - all of you - to promise me that when the time comes, you'll fight and help our triumph, just like the Writ says - that you'll support me against everyone."

For a moment, no-one did anything; then Jared raised his arm, shouting "You can count on me, Thera!" Rob's hand went up next; then the others. Thera was filled with satisfaction. Against even her own expectation, she'd pulled it off.

The next few weeks were quiet; Thera went about her errands and chores dutifully, thinking about what to do next. Some of the children sworn to her asked when she would make her move; she shoved them off, thinking. The only excitement in all that time was one of the Elders, who visited Thera's house, saying that he'd had rumors of heresy. Thera stared him down, sending him away with nothing; then she hunted down the tattler, pummeling him with the other children. From that point on she would have no dissension.

Finally, one turn of the moon later, Thera felt satisfied enough to approach the War-Leader. She was older, older even than Thera's parents, and scarred; still she was fit, though not so much as Thera thought she might have been in her prime. Thera implored her, using all her passion and speaking skill: Attack! Strike the infidel! End the world!

But the War-Leader refused. Shaking her head, she told Thera that she would have no such thing. The time was not yet; not in her generation, not even in the next, perhaps. The time would come, the War-Leader said with certainty; but their people were too few and too weak to attempt any such thing. "But," the War-Leader said smiling, "With such passion as yours, I'm sure you'll be a strong candidate for the position when I step down - and won't that be fun?"

"To hell with that," Thera said. "I challenge you now."

The War-Leader's expression froze; then she nodded, and took the ritual weapons down from their racks. Two staves made of hardwood, they could stun if used with restraint, mangle or kill if swung with force behind them.

The War-Leader took one; she gave Thera the other. They faced each-other outside the War-Leader's cabin, a small crowd quickly gathering around them. Jared was among them; Thera smiled at him, then lost the smile as she turned to the War-Leader. Her grip on the staff was strong.

The fight began. Thera was younger, stronger, faster. The War-Leader had the advantage of skill; but it had been years since there was any serious battle. The only reason she was still War-Leader was that no-one else wanted the position.

Thera fought viciously, and what experience the War-Leader had sufficed to keep her in the fight for less than a minute. Falling, she swung at Thera's unprotected chest; but paused first, for an instant, unwilling to really hurt the girl.

Thera showed no such reluctance. Her staff snapped out, blocked the blow just short of her body, then swiveled around the center, slamming into the War-Leader's head, leaving her limp and bleeding on the ground.

"Damn 'the next generation'; I am the War-Leader now," Thera declared. "And there will be no more delay."

Her parents looked on anxiously, arriving late to the scene; too late. For Thera was War-Leader now - beyond their control.

Faith: prologue

This is a story of a world that is not ours. There, as in our world, there are many faiths; but a few have more sway than most. And the greatest of them all, ruling most of the world in one form or another, says this: that the world will end in fire and death, and all of mankind will perish. And in their deaths, they will ascend unto heaven.

In what one might call the centre of this world (and certainly its inhabitants do), there are a cluster of high mountains and steep-walled valleys. There the refugees of civilization live: strange cults, weird peoples, driven out from their homelands and settled in a place far isolated from the rest of the world. Many of them die out there, lasting years or generations. Others have lasted for centuries, forgetting their origins. And a few - a very few - burst outwards from their sanctuary, entering once more onto the stage of the world.

Deep in the mountains, there is a cult, which holds in large part to the beliefs of the majority religion. But they fled because of one adjunct - the idea that the time has come for the world to end, and it is their role to end it by killing every living human. They found a rugged, but habitable valley, deep within the mountains, and have lived there for nearly eighty years, forgotten by the outside world, but still dedicated to their mission. Their faith is unwavering - yet their religious elders still sit, interpreting and reinterpreting their holy writ, and their war-leader sits pat, idly drafting plans for the Invoking of the Endtimes, repelling half-hearted raids from neighboring valleys. They are, in other words, nearly harmless, and seem unlikely to be of any importance whatsoever.

It won't last.