Tond, Book One: The Sons of Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis

Chapter 2
A Small Adventure

Ílda no klénnas ke súrann arn íldawal’ nel syélnas toká.
“Sometimes the exact details of a story depend on the teller.”
Fyorian poverb

    In southern Rohándal, in the place called Xóa Éyuhand (“Wind-Sound Oasis”), there had lived an ahíinor loremaster named Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis. He is the one who is credited with re-discovering the mechana for making the Fiery Eye, which looked like an ordinary flame (though suspended in a cubical shape knee-high off the ground) but showed events that were happening far away.
    It is also said that the Fiery Eye’s mechana may have been discovered by Tlaen’s friend Erlanni Ras-Tarinlein, or they may have discovered it together. It is also said, however, that Tlaen made sure that it became famous as “his” discovery and he presented it to the Master of Light at the council of ahíinor loremasters by himself. Whether Erlanni objected will probably never be known; the day that Tlaen presented the Fiery Eye was the day that the first cases of the Skullpox were reported in Xóa Éyuhand for the first time in sixty-eight years, and the ahíinor loremasters were called to help the sick and the dying and had no time to decide who had actually discovered one of the Ancients’ mechanas.
    The Skullpox struck with uncommon vengeance that year, killing one out of three people; one of the victims was Erlánni Ras-Tarinléin himself, who died childless. Tlaen’s wife Kelanna also grew ill, and she passed away in great agony. Tlaen himself was affected, but he and his son Rolan (who did not get the disease) both lived; Tlaen went through the rest of his life with the unsightly scars that are often seen on those who have survived. The following year Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis vanished out of Xóa Éyuhand for two years, leaving his son Rolan with an elder ahíinor loremaster named Keldar Ras-Áelinar. It is not known exactly where Tlaen went; presumably he spent some time far to the south in the Karjan Imperium or the Emb Lands, for when he returned to Xóa Éyuhand he had with him a second son named Arnul, who, like the peoples of the south, had dark hair. Tlaen also gave Arnul over to the care of Keldar, and then he vanished out of Xóa Éyuhand for good. It is rumored that he had let his loneliness over the loss of Kelanna drive him to despair, and he had wandered deep into the unknown desert heart of Rohándal and died.
    The sons of Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis, Rolan and Arnul, were four years apart, and since their father had vanished, they were raised by Keldar in the manner of the ahíinor loremasters. They grew strong and wise in the lore of their people. Rolan was muscular and stocky, with hair and eyes the color of the sands of the desert, a handsome face but with the somewhat long nose of his missing father Tlaen, intense dark eyes, and an expressive mouth that was often shaped into a smile. Arnul was lankier; he would probably be much taller when he reached adulthood. His long arms and legs gave him a somewhat spidery appearance. He had green eyes (very rare among the Fyorians) and hair the color of night; he was often described as “foreign” in appearance, though like Rolan he was considered handsome.
    There was another, more subtle difference. If asked to describe what this difference was, loremasters have said this: if Rolan were on a walk just outside of Xóa Éyuhand and came upon a nest of desert-rats, he would observe them carefully and for several hours, watching their coming and going and their bringing food back to the nest; he would stay until they were comfortable with his presence, and would remember the place and return the next day to see if anything had changed. If Arnul were on the same walk just outside of Xóa Éyuhand and were to come across the same nest of desert-rats, he would kick the nest to pieces and chase the rats away or throw stones on them; such vermin did not belong living so close to the world of the Fyorian ahíinor.
    Seasons followed seasons there in Xóa Éyuhand in south Rohándal, and the brothers grew. It was much later that they would become legends; Rolan Ras-Erkéltis himself would be the last to wield the Sword of Law before its powers vanished forever. But their tale is best begun in their childhood days there in Xóa Éyuhand, long before the Great Tales included them.

Council Town in South Rohándal, tenth month, Fyorian year 607

    The next Council of the Ahíinor was held during the Festival of the Autumn Moon in the town called South Palms, a four-days' journey south-east of Xóa Éyuhand. Rolan and Arnul went along with Keldar for the journey, though they could not attend the council. They traveled by night to avoid the burning sun of the desert; and when they reached the town, Rolan and Arnul spent their days exploring the markets and gardens and back alleys of the town and stayed up late every night to watch the autumn moon come up, followed by the parades and fireworks of the festival. Keldar seemed determined to spend the first two days sleeping in their inn.
    The council itself began on the third day. Rolan watched with fascination the hundred or so bearded ahíinor loremasters as they went in and came out of the council room every day with solemn expressions. At night, after the council’s meetings, Keldar hinted that they were discussing things like the appearance of more of the gruntagkshk (or “gruntags” as he shortened it to make it more pronounceable), those strange hybrid creatures they had seen in the Fiery Eye. Few had been spotted until recently, and now about a hundred were known, mostly living in the mountains of some place called Borrogg. Oddly, these creatures seemed to know when they were being observed (the ahíinor needed a mechana to see each other through the Eye). Also at the Council, they had discussed the fact that somebody had discovered a new mechana (Keldar didn't say what it could do), and the city of Taennishland, the city that moves and appears and disappears, was recently seen somewhere in a place called Kaii. One evening Keldar looked particularly grim; and he said that there had been a madman at the council, and that Gashug-Tairánda had been mentioned. This was a name of vague fear out of Rolan's early childhood, when the news had reached Xóa Éyuhand that something particularly dreadful had happened somewhere in the south in the Karjan Imperium, but Keldar wouldn't elaborate.
    The Council lasted nine days, but the Festival of the Autumn Moon only lasted seven, so on the eighth day Rolan and Arnul went to look at some buildings they had seen (from a distance) on the far side of the town. They found an inn, similar to the one where they had been staying. Upon going in they found that it had a very large front room with a high vaulted ceiling. A number of Fyorians (and people from other parts of Tond) were sitting at the tables, eating, drinking, and laughing. The air was thick with the delicious smell of bread baking. Rolan spotted a round table, elaborately carved with sinuous foliage patterns, and its center was concave, shaped like a bowl, and it had a net around it to catch the metal balls which were clustered in the center, if they were knocked out.
    “...Play you a game of ten-ball!" he said as soon as he saw it, but Arnul was already running over to it without looking where he was going, and he collided with a girl who was also walking over to play it with her father (a jovial looking fat man who, from his white clothes and floppy hat, was probably the owner of the inn.) The girl was about Rolan's age, and had a cute upturned nose, freckles, and blonde hair tied back in a ponytail.
    "Excuse me!" said Arnul. "Were you going over to play ten-ball too?"
    "Well, I was,” said the girl, "and it took me an hour to convince daddy to play a it with me! But I see you were going to play too, too. So I don't now how to decide who plays first."
    "All three of you run over to the table and the first one to pick up a ball plays with whoever he or she wants!" said the fat man with a chuckle, and Rolan and Arnul and the girl made a dash for the table and reached for the ten balls in the center. Rolan grabbed for a ball but saw another snatched up in front of his eyes; "I got one!" said the girl, Arnul batted it out of her hand.
    "Arnul, that's cheating!" said Rolan, and grabbed it. "Now I've got it!"
    The girl reached back for it; "I had it first!" (and Rolan gave it up without arguing.)
    "So I get to pay who I want to,” said the girl, and she looked directly at Rolan with her big dark eyes, "I choose, YOU!" and she turned back around and pointed at the fat man.
    "That's cheating." said Rolan again, but he and Arnul sat down by the side and waited their turn.
    The girl played first. She picked up one of the balls, put it at the edge of the table, and gave it a push, neatly knocking two of the other balls into the net on the other side.
    "Why don't you keep score?" she asked Rolan.
    "Two,” said Rolan. "Two for, uh, what's your name?"
    "Shillayne."
    "Two for Shillayne."
    The fat man took his turn; he also knocked out two balls, but one fell on his own side.
    "Let's see, one minus one, zero points for, uh, and your name...?"
    "Just call me Shillayne's dad."
    "Zero points for Shillayne's dad,” said Rolan.
    "What if I slip a glowball in there while they aren't looking?" said Arnul.
    Rolan didn't answer. The game continued. "Let's try this Karjan-style..." said the girl, and gave her ball a spin. It rolled around the table and knocked out three balls. "Wow, now I have five and there's only three left; looks like I win..."
    "How do you know the Karjans play it that way?" asked Rolan.
    "Been there," said Shillayne.
    "But so have I," stated the fat man, and he gave his ball a spin too; it rolled in an unexpected direction and missed the other three entirely, landing in the net on Shillayne’s side. “HA!” he laughed, and replaced the balls from his side on the table. She scowled.
    "Zero to zero,” said Rolan. "Starting over."
    "You've been to the Karjan Imperium?" Arnul asked the girl. "When? Is it true that the monster Gashug-Táiranda was created there?"
    “Don’t know. But there’s a ruined tower there. They say Gashug-Táiranda was created in it. They call the tower T’wadzadz; meaning ‘That which used to be a Tower’ in Karjannic.”
    “You speak Karjannic?” asked Rolan.
    “A little. Chlarch’hnagsko. I learned a little bit.”
    “We were only in the Imperium for about a month,” put in the fat man. “I was looking for curios for this inn. Shillayne’s good with languages; I could barely pronounce single words, and she was speaking in whole sentences by the time we left!”
    “Daddy, in Karjannic, words are sentences. You didn’t even learn that?” asked Shillayne. The fat man rolled his eyes.
    “How do you say it again?” asked Rolan.
    “Say what, ‘I leaned a little bit?’ Chlarch’hnagsko.”
    “cha...larch...hana...gus...ko,” said Rolan clumsily.
    Shillayne laughed. “Pretty good for a beginner, but you’re putting in too many vowels. Karjannic is mostly consonants. Try it again. Chlarch’hnagsko.”
    “ch’larch-hunag-sko.”
    “A little better. And tsaechbraksko means ‘I speak a little’. Oh, I know; try to say krichpfangsh. It means ‘hello’. Actually it means ‘my greetings to you’.”
    “kricha-puffang-ASKHHHH!” laughed Arnul suddenly (the final sound in Shillayne’s word was a raspy breath).
    Shillayne laughed too. “I think you both need more lessons.”
    Rolan tried it again, then asked, “Is gruntagkshk a Karjannic word?”
    “Hmmm. Gruntagkshk. Yes. It means, hmmm, let’s see... krutak is a ‘creature’ or a ‘monster’. Grutak is more than one. Gru-n-tak changes it into ‘creatures’ or ‘monsters’ DOING something; gruntag is they DID something, uh, no, it’s that something was done TO them; and kshk is what was done. But I’m not sure what it is. Maybe ‘invented’ or ‘constructed’. Where did you hear that word?”
    “From Keldar, an old man. He’s an ahíinor. He’s here for the council, and we’re here with him.”
Shillayne raised her eyebrows. “A traveling ahíinor...” then she tittered, though somehow the sound seemed filled with admiration. “They’re always coming up with strange words.”
    Arnul saw a break in the conversation, and put in, “Is it true what they say about the Karjans?”
    “What, that they have black hair like yours? Yes, it’s true, usually.”
    “Oh. And that their warriors attack cities and then drink the blood of their victims to get their strength?”
    “Ugh! That’s disgusting! You just made that up to make me sick!” she looked back at the fat man,    “Daddy, make him shut up.”
    The fat man said nothing except, “I think it’s your turn, Shillayne.”
    “Oh...” she surveyed the metal balls for a minute, took one, and knocked it into the others, hard, scattering them in all directions. Six landed in her father’s net, one in her own.
    “Five,” said Rolan. “Good shot. Back to where we were.”
    Presently, he noticed that conversations at the other tables were getting more animated, and the smell of baking bread was starting to smell a little burnt. But nobody else seemed to be paying attention; Shillayne’s father was eyeing the configuration of the balls on the table carefully. He muttered to himself, “If I hit this one there, it should knock that one there, but if I pick up this one to hit the others, this one might go over here, maybe I’ll try the Karjan spin move again and see if I can erase Shillayne’s points...” Then he broke off and addressed Arnul. “I’ve heard that the Karjan warriors used to drink blood like you said. But that was back when the Imperium was trying to take over Tond, and everything was meaner then. There was some kind of revolution in the Imperium or something about ten years ago; I don’t know exactly what happened except there’s a half-Sherványa queen ruling from one of their towers now. It was around the time they say the monster Gashug-Táiranda was created. But a lot of odd things happened then. It’s different now, not as mean. When we went to the Imperium it seemed quite peaceful. I got some curios there, like I said, including this ten-ball table, but it’s not really Karjan-style; I bought it from a merchant who traded it from somewhere up north, Kaii maybe. Anyway if you want to see something really interesting, take a look at that little statue over there.”
    He pointed to one of the nearby tables; two Fyorians were sitting at it talking, one looked quite drunk. In the center of the table stood a figurine of a Karjan tsajuk warrior, about the size of a desert-squirrel standing upright, carved in white wood and covered with detailed, realistic armor and chain-mail, leaning on a slightly curved sword which gleamed brightly, almost as if by its own light. The warrior wore a fierce expression on his face, as if to challenge the viewer to a duel, and his black hair was tied into many tufts in the Karjan style. His eyes were, of all things, red cut glass, so they gleamed fiery in the light that seemed to come from the sword.
    “Wow!” said Arnul. “That’s quite something!”
    “...and I’ll give it to the first one of you who can beat me five times a row a ten-ball!” said the fat man as he gave his ball a roll. It knocked into the others but only one fell out, on his own side.
    “Six for Shillayne!” said Rolan. “Maybe I’ll take you up on that challenge.”
    “No, I saw the statue first!” said Arnul.
    “Make it beat you three times at ten-ball,” said Shillayne. “I think that statue’s ugly.”
    “Just like what a girl would say...” commented Arnul.
    Their conversation was abruptly interrupted. A big, bosomy woman had stomped up from behind them, and now stood there, hands on wide hips, surveying the four of them with a scowl. She glared at the fat man. “So there you are, Mr. Play-With-The-Children,” she growled. “I thought I told you to watch the bread while I went out to the market to get the food for tonight. Well I got the food, but the bread’s spoiled, and you’re out here playing ten-ball with Shillayne and two boys you don’t even know, and now we have to think of something else to serve our guests tonight.”
    “I was playing in a tournament; the winner gets that Karjan statue,” explained the fat man.
    “The winner gets the Karjan statue?! Some inn-keeper you are!” the woman continued, her voice growing progressively harsh. “You’re out here playing with the children, not watching when some of your customers are getting just a little bit drunk” (she meant the man sitting at the table with the statue) “...and you’re trying to give things away again! You’re always trying to give things away! And to anybody who can beat you at ten-ball, and you never win anyway! I thought things like that was for the customers’ amusement, not to be given away when you feel like it! Now tell them they can’t have it, and get yourself back into the kitchen or I’ll do something really drastic!”
    “...Promise...?” the fat man chuckled.
    “Humph!” she snorted and started to walk off, then brusquely turned and grabbed him around the elbow and pulled him away. “That’s no way to speak in front of our daughter. Now come with me!” She yanked on his arm, and he followed her out of the room with a shrug. “And you could have helped me carry some of the food!” she exclaimed as they disappeared behind a door.
    “...That was my mom,” said Shillayne. “At least you know when she’s around. Anyway, one of you can take Daddy’s place at ten-ball here. Oh, and I don’t think I ever heard your names.”
Rolan and Arnul introduced themselves. “...and I want that statue,” said Arnul.

    The moon was high in the dark sky, and the air was getting chilly, when the two boys emerged from the inn, and began the long walk back to Keldar’s room.
    “Now you’ve gotten us in trouble again,” said Rolan. “If you hadn’t said ‘yes’ when they asked us to stay for dinner... You don’t even like chicken in sánatar sauce.”
    “Me gotten us in trouble? You’re the one that just had to keep playing ten-ball!” Arnul replied.
    “I thought you were! You wanted that dumb statue! What would you do with it anyway, even if you had won it?”
    “Keep it somewhere away from you.”
    “Right. Well anyway it’s way past our bedtime, and Keldar will give us a riot when we get home. Why did you have to go and try the Sherványa cherry-wine anyway!?”
    “It was good.”
    “True. But it’s not really made for children. So we had to sit there and listen to Shillayne play the kitál and sing that gruesome song while we were sick.”
    “I liked that song,” said Arnul. “...and you were the one looking moon-eyed at her while she was singing it!”
    “And what would you know about that? You’re far too young. Besides, it was a very long song, and it was gruesome.”
    “...And while they stood on that windy shore...” began Arnul.
    “Arnul, I said I didn’t like that song! What’d you do, anyway, memorize it!?”
    “...The elder sister pushed the younger o’er...”
    “About what I’m going to do to you....”
    “No, it says sister, not brother. Besides we’re nowhere near a shore. Hmmm, I wonder what a shore is like. They say it’s where the water meets the sand. But we’ve never been anywhere where there’s anything besides sand and rocks. Anyway... Some times she sank and some times she swam / crying ‘sister reach to me your hand’ /and there she floated just like a swan / the sea waves carried her body on / two minstrels saw the maiden float to land... Oh, I forget the rest.”
    “Good.”
    “Something about a harp which would melt a heart of stone. oh, I remember; they took three strands of her yellow hair / used them to string that harp so rare... What’s a harp, anyway?”
    “It’s like a kitál, but you stand it up beside you to play it, rather than lying it down on your lap. Anyway I don’t remember how to get back from here. Do we turn left or right here?”
    “Left.”
    “You’re sure?”
    “Positive.”
    “Good. So we’ll turn right. Follow me.”
    And so they continued bickering and walking slowly through the empty streets of the desert town, and finally Rolan saw a familiar building at the end of the alley in front of them.
    “There’s our inn,” he said. “Let’s hope Keldar hasn’t waited up for us; at least we’ll be safe for tonight. Oh, looks like everybody else in the inn has gone to bed too. There are only a couple of small lights in the front windows. So let’s hope the doors aren’t locked.”
    They came to the front door, opened it easily.
    “Not locked.” They proceeded in; the front room was dark, lit only by a few small candles, and the night watchman was slumped over at one of the tables, snoring. They tiptoed past him and up the stairs to Keldar’s room. Rolan walked in first, bracing himself for an onslaught of words from Keldar. Instead, the room was silent and completely dark.
    “Come on in,” he said quietly to Arnul, “I think Keldar’s asleep. We will be in a lot of trouble tomorrow, but I think it’s safe for now.”
    Arnul walked in, and shut the door behind him with a reassuring thud.
    “Now,” said Rolan, “Where does Keldar keep that glowball...?” he felt around in the darkness. “Or at least a candle...?”
    “I think there’s a candle over on the table by the window,” came Arnul’s voice. “Ow, what was that...? Rolan, there’s something here in the middle of the floor, no, that’s the table. Ah, here’s the candle, wait, is this a glowball? Let me see if I can find the finger-holes...”
    “That won’t be necessary!” boomed a loud voice, and suddenly the room was flooded with light. There were four suspended glowballs, one in each corner, and Keldar was standing by the door with two other ahíinor loremasters. One of them was vaguely familiar. Keldar wore a frown, but the others were expressionless, their long beards and their robes glistening in the light.
    “Looks like we’re in a lot of trouble now,” said Rolan. Arnul had disappeared; Rolan saw him cowering in the far corner.
    “Where have you two been?” asked Keldar. “No, I’ll skip that question now. But you are in a lot of trouble. I’ll get to that later.” He turned to the other loremasters, slowly, without losing his frown.
“Rolan and Arnul, sons of Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis, allow me to introduce Eilann Kun-Táninos and Renil Kun-Réidos, ahíinor loremasters of Séyar Éyuhand. You both met Eilann once, or at least you saw him in the Fiery Eye, that night you snuck in to spy on me. We have all been waiting for you to return.”
“Pleased to meet you,” said Rolan, bowing low to the two loremasters in the Fyorian manner, but his heart was pounding. Arnul bowed too, still in his corner; he was trembling and almost fell over.
“We have a question to ask you,” said all three loremasters at the same time. Rolan’s feeling abruptly changed, and he looked up with wide eyes. He had heard of ahíinor speaking in unison like that, ceremonially, using the long versions of people’s names, and he thought he knew what it meant, or he hoped, deeply, that he thought he knew what it meant...
    “The day after tomorrow is the last day of the council,” intoned the three loremasters. “There might be two young ahíinor allowed into the council on the last day, if they would agree. Rolan Ras-Erkéltis, son on Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis, ahíinor of Xóa Éyuhand in South Rohándal, would you agree to letting the two young ahíinor into the council on the last day?”
    Rolan bowed again, his heart pounding, for a different reason. He was going to be an apprentice loremaster! “Yes, I would agree to it,” he said as part of the ceremony.
    “...And you, Arnul Ras-Erkéltis, son of Tlaen Ras-Erkéltis, ahíinor of Xóa Éyuhand in South Rohándal, would you also agree to letting the two young ahíinor into the council on the last day?”
Silence. Rolan looked, Arnul had fainted.
    “I think he says ‘yes’ too,” he said.
There was a hint of a smile on Keldar’s weathered face. The ceremony continued, “Then we will see the two young ahíinor the day after tomorrow in the council room, after they have each found a mechana tomorrow and remembered that the mechanas came from the Ancients. We will be waiting.” One of them opened the door and they walked out without another sound, leaving Rolan and Anrul and Keldar alone. The door closed.
    There was a moment of silence. Then Keldar yelled, “Now get to bed!” Arnul jumped up as if struck, and Rolan collapsed on the floor. “And don’t forget, you’re still in trouble!”

    The next day, Keldar made Rolan and Arnul a breakfast of mushy apples and sweetened oat porridge containing small chips of dried chicken liver (a breakfast for being in trouble). Then he went to the council again, and the two brothers, after they were done gagging, wandered back over to the inn on the other side of the town, hoping to find Shillayne. She was sitting at an otherwise unoccupied table, strumming on her kitál. When she saw them, she put the instrument beside her on the table, and motioned for them to sit down.
    “Krichpfangsh!” Rolan tried the Karjannic greeting again.
    “Oh — you’ve been practicing! Krichpfangmosh – that’s ‘Greetings to you too’,” Shillayne replied, then she motioned to the instrument. “…Just trying to learn a new song,” she said, “I always thought that one about the two sisters should have a happy ending.”
    “Well, it is a Drennic song, and I always thought things were gloomy up there in the north anyway,” said Rolan. “And I must admit, certain parts of that song were pretty gruesome.”
    “I like the part where they stabbed the…” began Arnul.
    “Swallow a whole mango!” Rolan cut him off. The expression meant to be quiet.
    “I was going to change that part!” laughed Shillayne. “But I can’t really think of how it should go right now. I can think of something else, though… I’m assuming that you’re back today to try to beat me a ten-ball again. Arnul just had to get that statue! Impossible, I can tell you!”
    This time Rolan laughed. “I almost beat you yesterday... We could play again, of course, though it looks like somebody else is playing right now.” (Several children and adults were clustered around the game-table.) “But actually we wanted to ask you something else.”
    “…More cherry-wine?” she laughed again.
    “Yes! Yes! For my brother!” put in Arnul.
    Rolan scowled. “No, no, not that. Shillayne, have you heard of ‘mechanas’?”
    She glanced down at the table, looking thoughtful. “Well of course I’ve heard of them, those weird little things that the loremasters use. Daddy mentioned them yesterday. But I can’t say that I know anything about them. I’ve asked a couple of loremasters that have stayed at this inn, of course, but they have a way of keeping things secret. They always say that their lore is not for women or girls. Rather stuck-up of them, if you ask me.”
    Arnul glared at her. “Do not insult the ahíinor!”
    Rolan repeated, “Swallow another whole mango, Arnul.” Then he asked Shillayne, “Maybe you don’t know about mechanas, but do you have any idea where we could find one?”
    Her dark eyes narrowed quizzically. She answered, “Ask a loremaster, of course.”
    “But that’s the point. They want us to find one, Arnul and I, today — one each, actually. It’s part of the initiation. Of course they won’t tell us where to find them.”
    She glanced quickly at Rolan, but her expression was unreadable. “…Initiation!? You’re going to be a loremaster?” Her cheeks turned a little red. “…Sorry about what I said about being stuck-up…”
Rolan laughed. “I expected somebody to say it anyway. And, I’m not going to be a loremaster just yet, that is, until I manage to find a mechana.”
    “Hmmm…” Shillayne scratched her head. “You know, the mechanas are said to be ancient, left over from some kind of old world, before ours. They say that they were scattered around Tond during the Devastation, though I would be surprised if it would be easy to find any. Let’s see, the loremasters have been looking for about two hundred years, so they say; and that means that certainly all of the mechanas that are easy to find have already been found. So that leaves the hard ones.”
    “Somebody mentioned at the Council that one was found recently,” Arnul said. “Northwards somewhere.”
    “Which means that if there’s another one there, you couldn’t find it in a week,” added Shillayne.
    “She figures things out quickly,” said Arnul.
    Rolan ignored him. “Actually we don’t expect that we’d have to go very far. We already realized that the loremasters already have those that are easy to find. And the ones that are hard to find, well, we certainly wouldn’t know where to look. But I said this was part of the initiation. There have been loremasters walking around this town for several days now.”
    “Ahhh. You think they hid one, or two, somewhere.”
    “Of course. They wouldn’t expect us to find one otherwise…”
    “So why do you ask me?”
    “You live here, of course.”
    “Here, in this inn? They hid some here?”
    “Well why not?”
    “Hmmm.” She scratched her head again. “Last night, that’s when you guys were here, there were a couple of ahíinor at that table over there.” She motioned to a table to their left. “But they didn’t go anywhere else, didn’t even rent a room. They just drank a couple of mugs of cherry-wine, paid Daddy, and left.”
    “Which means that they might have left something on or under the table!” Arnul blurted before she finished her description, and he leaped up. His feet unexpectedly collided with something orange and soft and furry, and he sprawled onto the floor. Rolan snickered. The furry thing let out a yelp and a meow, and jumped up onto Shillayne’s lap.
    “Are you all right?” She asked.
    Arnul sat up, but looked ready to cry. “…I think so…” he muttered.
    “Not you! I meant the cat!” said Shillayne. Rolan’s laughter reached a howl. Shillayne introduced the cat as Whiskers, and stroked its back until it started to purr, evidently unfazed by Arnul’s clumsiness. Rolan continued to laugh, much to Arnul’s consternation; finally the younger boy stood up and aimed a fist at Rolan. Rolan ducked, and Shillayne said, “Be careful! You’ll upset the cat here. Besides if you start fighting, I’ll go over there and get that hidden mechana myself!”
    “Aha, so you’re admitting that you know there is one there!” said Rolan, and he stood up. Arnul tripped him and he clumsily sprawled onto the floor. This time Shillayne guffawed, and the cat ran away.
Rolan stood. “Truce?”
    “Truce,” said Arnul.
    “Good. Now let’s go look together – it shouldn’t be this difficult to go halfway across a room to another table!”
    The three of them ran over to the other table. It was, of course, an ordinary table much like the one they had just been sitting at. Round, made of wood, supported by four wooden legs; there was an unlit candle sitting on it and two chairs next to it. There was nothing else, sitting on it or near it, or stuck somehow to its underside or legs.
    “Boring!” Arnul intoned.
    “Not here — that leaves everywhere else in this inn,” Shillayne commented. “We could go and look in every room, of course, though there aren’t any loremasters staying here right now…”
Rolan interrupted. “Actually, I don’t think they’d put it anywhere here anyway; and certainly not anywhere in plain sight like on this table. I think they probably hid it somewhere that looks more mysterious. You know how they are always trying to look mysterious. And of course they hid it, not just put it somewhere. Is there a place in this town, like a tunnel or a secret passage or something…?”
    “Well if it’s too secret I certainly wouldn’t know about it! But of course there are always those stories. ‘Anywhere that Fyorians build, there are hidden doors and passageways underground…’” (She chuckled at the quote.) “I know of one near here. It goes from under the street to out near the Tombs; there are some farms out there and the farmers used to stash extra grain in the tunnel to keep from paying tax to the Master of Light. There’s another tunnel over on the other side of town, but I don’t know where it goes.”
    Arnul was scratching his head. “Tombs! How old are they?”
    “From the Ancients.”
    Rolan raised an eyebrow. “Well, for once you figured out a clue quicker to me! Keldar did say to remember that the mechanas came from the Ancients. Shillayne, could you show us the passageway?”     “Well — no, not really. I have to go to school today, and I’m supposed to stay here to help mommy and daddy anyway, and besides, they’d get upset about me leaving with a couple of boys. …But I could tell you where it is.”
    “That would do,” said Rolan.
    Shillayne gave a mischievous smile. “You’ll each have to play me a game of ten-ball,” she said, and motioned to the game-table; there were still several other children playing the game.
    “We’re next!” Arnul exclaimed.

    It was the hot part of the midafternoon when the two boys came to the street that Shillayne had described. On the left side of the street, there was the house with red-orange adobe and a garden in front that seemed to be growing mostly flowers. On the right side, there was the small shop with the elaborately carved wooden sign reading

“Small Items from Woodworkers Syémilar and Túnlei: wooden bowls and eating utensils; walking-staffs and canes, small cabinets and racks, gameboards, curios and knick-knacks. Rare and interesting wood imported from Kaii, the Drennlands, the Karjan Imperium and the Emb Lands.”

    “Well, this looks like the place,” said Rolan. “She mentioned the wood-shop and the flower-garden. I think she said the doorway should be behind the house with the flower garden, behind the gate.”
And surely enough, there was a dirt path leading up to a wooden fence beside the house with the bright adobe. There was a gate in the exact middle of the fence, taller than either of them and arched overhead. It was made of slats carved with scenes of foliage, with one odd section painted in wide undulating stripes of blue, brown, and white; a horizontal pattern perhaps made from the wood-grain itself. Some of the paint had chipped off.
    “Hmmm, she mentioned that part of the gate was an old Drenn painting that had been reclaimed. I think this painted part must be that, so now I’m certain that this is the right place,” said Rolan.
    “She also mentioned that you couldn’t see behind on one side of the fence,” Arnul added, peering closely at the wooden slats on the left side. “I can see through here. There’s another garden behind. Must be the other side.”
    “It is,” Rolan replied; he strained to look through the boards on the other side, the right side, but could see nothing but blackness behind.
    “This is it,” said Rolan. “Shall we go in?” Arnul stared at him, “That’s why we’re here, stupid.” Rolan ignored him and rattled the gate with his hands. It did not move. He looked for a lock or latch, but could find nothing.
    “Well it certainly is secret,” said Arnul. “Anybody trying to get in would think that the gate must only be for decoration, and it doesn’t really move at all. Do you think Shillayne really knew there was a passage here?” Rolan did not answer, so he continued, “Of course, we could just kick it in.”
    “No, look!” Rolan said suddenly. He had been feeling along the bottom edge of the gate, carefully, to avoid splinters. His hand touched a small metal protrusion.
    “Just a nail,” Arnul said confidently.
    “Nails don’t move like this,” said Rolan, and he pulled on it. Click. Something unlocked, and the gate swung open inwards, towards the right. He went in. Arnul shrugged and followed. Rolan shut the gate behind them. They did not seem to have entered a secret passageway. The house with red-orange adobe continued back on their left for about twenty feet, back to what seemed to be another street. The wood-shop building was about the same size. Between them was a garden, and several pumpkin plants were growing in the tilled soil; one had a small but ripe pumpkin. The air was still and much hotter than outside of the gate.
    There was a door to their right, made of weathered wooden slats like the gate, though it appeared to be much older. Words were painted directly on it in shiny black; they were not weathered so they had probably been made recently.

GÁRNYUWEN! (NEVER ENTER!)

    “I’ll assume it’s misspelled,” said Rolan (“Please enter” would only be one letter different in Fyorian), and he pushed on the door. Again, it was locked solid. It would not budge.
    “Again, I’ll say we could kick it in,” said Arnul.
    Rolan wrinkled an eyebrow, then turned away and felt along the wood of the door. There was no underside. It came right to the floor and there was not enough room to get his fingers underneath. The side edges were also tight against the walls. He ran his fingertips along the front. Not quite carefully enough; he pulled back with a yelp and pulled a half-inch sliver from his finger. No blood; it just smarted a little.
    “You try looking for something,” he said to Arnul.
    “It’s probably over there.” Arnul pointed to five nails driven into the side of the wood-shop building, in a vertical straight line; Rolan had not noticed them before. Arnul pulled on one of the nails, and of course it did not budge. “Maybe not,” he said.
    “There are five of them. Why give up after just one?”
    “Hmmm…” Arnul tried to move the bottom nail in the line; it was just as solid. So were the other three.
    “You don’t suppose you have to know some of those formulae that the loremasters say,” said Rolan. “Like when they use their mechanas. This lock could be a mechana of some kind! Or…” He had had another idea, and he stepped over to the nails, but then stooped over to inspect the grassy ground closely. It was overgrown with weeds.
    “What are you looking for?”
    “This,” he replied, pointing to a shallow square indentation in the ground. Not a natural shape for dirt or grass to assume. Rolan put his foot on it, and it sunk slightly deeper. Then, clunk, something slipped inside of the wall.
    “Now try the nails,” he said.
    Arnul grabbed the top nail again. Still it did not budge. He tried the second, again with no results. He tried the third, and it pulled slightly upwards. The same for the fourth. The fifth would not move, but he tried the first again, and there was another click.
    Rolan pushed on the door, and it swung open. There were stairs behind it, leading down into darkness. Rolan stepped in; Arnul stayed back. “Maybe this is where we go back.”
    Rolan stared at him from inside the doorway. “Do you want to be a loremaster or not…?”
    Arnul hesitated, then scowled and walked in, glancing around fearfully. Rolan stepped in front of him and said, “Remember — it was you who led me into Keldar’s lore-room that night!”
    “True enough!” said Arnul, suddenly meeting Rolan’s stare, and then he pushed his brother aside and descended three steps. He turned around. “Are you sure?”
    Rolan rolled his eyes and almost laughed. “We’ll go together,” he said, holding Arnul’s hand. He didn’t really want to admit that he was beginning to feel a little frightened himself.
    The stairs were steep and irregular, made of cold gray stone, and difficult to see. The two of them felt ahead with their feet to make sure that each next step was solid, and proceeded. Down, into underground; the walls around them were also made of gray stone. The light from the doorway slowly became dimmer and then seemed to vanish altogether. Here they paused, waiting for their eyes to adjust (Rolan could feel Arnul trembling slightly); but after a couple of minutes they decided that they weren’t going to be able to see any better.
    Rolan nudged Arnul to pull the glowball (Keldar’s) from out of his pocket, which he shakily did. He handed it to Rolan, who put his finger in the fingerhole, “opening” the light.
Now they could see. The walls and stairs were not only of irregular gray stone, but were actually crumbling in places. Cracks were visible in all directions, filled with dirt. There was another wall directly in front of them, and the stairs bent to the right.
    Rolan peered around the bend, and saw that the stairs came to a flat hallway which continued more or less straight as far as the glowball cast its light. He pulled Arnul with him, and stepped down the last three stairs. The walls, ceiling, and floors were all of the same kind of stone, and the passage was just wide enough for the two of them to walk side by side, though the ceiling arched several feet over their heads. The air was becoming musty, and there were more cracks in the stone; but no fallen rocks blocked their way. Rolan suspended the glowball slightly above eye level, and rolled it ahead. The passage continued straight for some time; they caught up to the glowball and rolled it ahead again.
Rolan could not be sure exactly how long they continued in this manner. The hall was seemingly endless, and monotonous; Rolan kept expecting to see something different: a different kind of stone in the walls or floor, a little recessed area, a section that was severely cracked and pockmarked. But nothing changed. He decided that he would even welcome the sight of a mouse or rat (such things lived in places like this, of course), but there was no movement or sound besides their heavy footprints.
    Finally Arnul said, “This is awful! We’ve been in here for two hours. How do we even know if we’re going the right way, and how do we even know that if we turn back, the gate will still be open? And can we open it from the inside, if it’s not!?” Rolan jumped at his sudden speech, so loud there in the still air, and he could see panic beginning in his brother’s eyes. He didn’t feel so sure himself, though he was certain that it had been a lot less than two hours. All he could say was, “Well don’t back out now! We’ve already come this far!” He grabbed Arnul by the shoulder and pushed him ahead slightly, trying to act braver than he was. Arnul froze, then reluctantly took another step. Rolan followed.
    They caught up to the glowball again, and Rolan rolled it forward.
    And saw something different.
    Finally.
    “I think that’s the end!” Rolan said, quite loudly, both so Arnul could hear it and so he could hear himself say it. There was an arch-shaped darkness up there; when they caught up the found that the hall branched like a T into two directions, both which seemed to ascend rapidly, though the light from the glowball was rather feeble and could not penetrate far into the shadows in either direction. “…Well?” said Arnul.
    Rolan sniffed the air. Certainly it was fresher now than it had been; the earthy smell was replaced by dry air with hints of flowers and grasses. The aroma was slightly stronger from the left than the right.
    “I guess the left side goes up to the surface,” he said, “So the right side might be where they could hide something, but I think some fresh air would be good first. Let’s go to the left.”
    Arnul agreed, and bounded ahead into the darkness.
    And screamed.

    It took Rolan a second to recover. Then he ran forward as well, grabbing the glowball as he went. He found Arnul just a few steps ahead, cowering nearly on the floor, and there were steps going up just beyond him. He could see nothing else.
    “What happened?”
    Arnul was visibly shaken, but he tried to stand. “N-n-n-nothing really… Just those cobwebs… almost scared me out of Tond!”
    Rolan nearly slapped him. “I thought I had to rescue you from something!” he snapped, and he muttered (loud enough for Arnul to hear), “Where’s a real monster when you need one!?”
    But the ceiling was full of hanging webs, now that he looked more closely — nearly invisible, threadlike, and hanging to his waist. They began about where Arnul was, and continued up to the edge of the stairs, and maybe beyond.
    Rolan took the glowball down from its position at eye level, and rolled it to the stairs. The moving luminescence made the webs stand out like thin lines of light and shadow, which bent and swayed in the slightly moving air. Rolan mused that cobwebs were nothing to be afraid of, but it would be terrible if they were actually living tentacles from some creature hiding behind the wall or ceiling. Not that such a thing was likely, but the thought unnerved him.
    Arnul had recovered by now, and he went first towards the stairs, crouching to avoid the hanging strings. Rolan followed, and he was relieved that none of them tried to grab him. The boys reached the stairs quickly, and started up.
    The air grew fresher almost immediately, and soon light was visible. Not the shadowy, shifting light from the glowball, but the dazzling radiance of daylight. And in another minute, they had stepped out of the tunnel; the stairs simply continued right up to the surface.
    Rolan’s courage was returning. He blinked and shielded his eyes from the sunlight. He could see nothing at first because of the glare, but he was quite certain that it was not yet evening (they hadn’t been in the passage very long at all!); even if the sunlight had not been so bright, the heat of the desert day was still oppressive.
    Their eyes began to adjust. They were standing on the edge of the town, so it appeared; in front of them were the sands and scrub of the desert, stretching off towards the horizon. Behind them were buildings, small scruffy-looking shacks and lean-tos, the kind used for storage and found at the edges of Fyorian towns. And to their left was something much grander, shimmering in the heat: at the far end of a broad expanse of ochre sand lay an array of lodges and mesas and fantastical pointed pinnacles, all of red and brown stone.
    “Those would be the Tombs,” Rolan said.
    “…But they’re out there in the sand! We can’t go that far out; there are poisonous snakes out there!” Arnul objected.
    “There are also your favorites out there,” Rolan replied, referring to the edible cactuses of which Arnul was particularly fond. “Besides, I don’t know if we have to go out there or not. Nobody ever said anything about where our mechana might be. It was only a guess, and a hint from Keldar. Maybe we should poke around here for clues first, if they aren’t back down in that other underground room.”
He began to look along the ground, though of course he was not entirely sure of what he might find. Arnul joined him, sweating, either from the suddenly hot air or fear of going out to the tombs.
    It was not long before their search was rewarded. Arnul saw them first — footprints, leading from near the emergence of the stairs, towards the nearer shacks. He pointed them out to Rolan, and the two of them followed. The trail was obscured in some places by wind-blown sand and dirt, but it appeared to be fairly fresh.
    Right up next to a wooden lean-to, the prints disappeared. Rolan had been so intent on keeping his eyes on them that he didn’t stand up when they ended (he kept looking around at the ground) and nearly crashed into the stone pillar. As it was, he saw its stone base, and looked up just in time to step not-very-nimbly out of the way, and he nearly tripped. Arnul giggled, obviously beginning to feel more confident, “I tripped you in the inn, but you’re getting worse — how could an immobile stone block trip you!?”
    “Swallow a whole mango,” was all Rolan could say. The pillar was an obvious marker for something, though he didn’t know what, and (ignoring Arnul’s continued snickering) he examined it. It was made of marble, so it looked, rather expensive and heavy material; it was probably a foot thick, square in the cross-section (or vaguely trapezoidal), and about seven feet tall. He couldn’t see if there was (or had been) anything on top of it, but one side was decorated with carved symbols. He couldn’t make them out at first, until he got to exactly the right place and the sun shone onto it from a perfect angle. Then he could read them as Fyorian letters:

COUNCIL ÉYUHAND AND GRAND CAVERN
ESTABLISHED AT SOUTH PALMS
IN THE 3RD YEAR OF THE REIGN OF MASTER OF LIGHT TÚRATH RAS-XÉLDUSAR
AS MEETING PLACE FOR THE COUNCIL OF AHÍINOR EVERY FIVE YEARS.

    And it continued with a long list of names and dates, the history of the town.
    “It’s probably interesting,” said Rolan, “If we were to come here later when it’s cooler, and if we knew something about these people. But for now it’s just a place-marker; tells us nothing about our mechana.” Arnul had quit smirking. “But the footprints led right up to it, and we can probably assume that they were Keldar’s prints, because they were recent.”
    “But they could be somebody else’s — how secret can this place really be?” Rolan responded, but at the same he examined the ground to see if any footprints led away from the pillar in a different direction. There were only two or three that seemed to retrace the first set and then disappear into the sand, by two tall sticks that had been shoved into the ground vertically.
    “Hey — look over here,” said Arnul, pointing to another side of the pillar.
    Rolan peered around to the other side, and saw more writing. Not carvings, but thin letters smeared on the stone with what appeared to be soap. They were barely visible, and he had completely overlooked them before.

BROTHERS RAS-ERKÉLTIS,
CONGRADULATIONS.
YOU HAVE FOUND YOUR WALKING-STAFFS.

    “Well, this is the right place!” exclaimed Rolan, and then, “…but of course it’s not; because this is telling us something about walking-staffs, not mechanas, and I certainly don’t know anything about…”     His words trailed off. Both he and Arnul stared at the sticks shoved in the ground; each was about as tall as a man, and each was slightly bent and knobby and made of darkwood. They were like the staffs carried by the ahíinor. And the staffs carried by the ahíinor were mechanas, it was said.