The Eleventh Tome – Chapter VI

The Prophecies of Andrapaal

The Eleventh Tome

Chapter VI

written by: Tim Law

Year 513 of the Kingdom of Thuraen

Fredrickson the Third is King

Vladimir the Young is Chief Sage

The night watch from the towers of knowledge, cried out that the evening crept yet another hour closer to midnight and curfew. The truth keeper Raven, headed out with his sheathed blade in hand to make peace with himself and to honour his scheduled meeting with the council of sages.
As he mounted one by one the steps that led up to the palace, oblivious to the street sounds around him, Raven thought about just how much and how quickly his home had changed over the ten years he had been away until it had made him feel like a stranger.
‘With luck tonight’s meeting with such wise men will reveal the location of the city beneath,’ thought Raven. ‘It will also be a great opportunity to officially hand in my blade.’ He was hopeful that over the next hour or even less time he would be able to close the chapter on the mysteries surrounding both Paechra and his own fathers. Raven had mixed feelings about leaving the truth keepers, the brotherhood that he had grown up with and the lessons from his early years of life that being part of such an elite and important group within Thuraen had given Raven the strong impression that being a truth keeper was the greatest and most honourable of roles to strive for. In the years alone, searching for the lost sage Morthos, seeking revenge for slaughtered friends, years wasted on an unfulfilled quest had steered Raven toward the conclusion that such an honourable role was no longer his fate.

At the bottom of the second flight of stone steps which Raven climbed he averted his eyes from the palace for a moment. As the palace, the architectural symbol of the royalty that lived within and a sign of the holiness of the books of truth the palace held came back into Raven’s vision, a huge shadowy beast dropped from the night sky above him. It sped quickly downwards with leathery wings spread, Raven as its obvious target. Instincts learnt less from the truth keeper training and more from experiences battling the vorsurk alone Raven immediately took up a combat stance. The beast halted its accelerated dive only a hair’s width away from the truth keeper’s face, opening its mouth wide the dark scaled dragon breathed a hideous breath smelling partly of rotting meat and partly of a strong acid. Raven immediately attempted to draw the weapon he held in his hands only to discover, to his gut wrenching horror that for the first time in his memory, the blade stuck fast in its sheath.

To the knight of truth, this moment felt like an eternity. His heart beat faster and, in fear, he stumbled backwards three steps. This caused a few others nearby who were making their way to the palace that night, to alter their course. All around Raven, people began mumbling angrily at him, before continuing on their way. All that Raven saw and heard however, was the massive, black scaled dragon.

For the sake of the sylva who had so elegantly called to him, Thur the spirit of air made the dragon image of itself young and small, only a hatchling, but to the untrained eye of the truth keeper it was a frightening beast. All that Raven could see was the diamond shaped head, mouth full of sharp daggers, red gleaming eyes, scales the color of midnight that seemed to absorb rather than reflect the torch light, all these things made for the truth keeper a horrific scene. It was attacking the city without warning and was a barricade between the truth keeper and the steps to enlightenment that led to the palace and his destination, the halls of knowledge. With his wide frightened eyes staring upwards, Raven stifled a cry in his throat as the dragon took a great breath and then suddenly dropped from the sky and sped towards him.
‘Why do the citizens stay and watch me so? Flee fools! Find the truth keepers!’ Raven thought to himself as he partially shifted his eyes away from the speeding jaws, and flicked a glance of desperation at those citizens out that night, busy with their own business. As he watched his fellow citizens, not once did Raven completely lose sight of those glowing red embers that seemed to hold his gaze to that of the dragon. Thur chuckled silently to itself all through the decent.
‘Is this the end?’ thought Raven. ‘Is it to be my fate to be the meal of this mythical creature?’
GREETINGS EARTHLING, BROTHER OF THE SOFT SOIL, THE MOUNTAIN STONE, I GREET YOU AS A FAVOUR OF THE DAUGHTER OF AIR, stated the dragon, but the words were not said aloud, instead flowing straight into Raven’s mind.
‘Am I dreaming?’ Raven thought. ‘A nightmare while I am awake?’
NAY SMALL ONE, Thur replied, the voice full of mirth. YOU ARE AWAKE AND WHILE WE ARE SO CLOSE I READ YOUR THOUGHTS AND SEND YOU MINE.
“And the wind sent you?” Raven asked, still unsure if he were truly face to face with a dragon or back at the forge imagining the whole encounter.
“Go home and sleep it off!” called a passerby.
Raven noticed that the man physically avoided the space occupied by the dragon but also avoided looking directly at the creature.
CHILD I AM THE WIND!!! Thur roared, the jaws of the gigantic worm snapping shut as the lips of the scaled beast formed into a dangerous smile.
Daring to avert his eyes for a moment, Raven caught sight of a tiny speck of light that drifted from the nearest torch that illuminated the stone steps. With minute wings, the speck of light guided itself to land upon the platform that was Raven’s nose. The truth keeper’s unfocused eyes thought that through the light, the image looked somewhat like his long past mother.
THUR REFERS TO YOUR TRAVELLING COMPANION, the light replied. Even the voice of the fairy that sounded faint as it spoke, resembled so closely the sound of the mother Raven so loved and still missed. The winged woman stared directly into one of the flaming orbs of the dragon, causing the scaled beast to draw back its head about a yard so that it could focus upon both the truth keeper and the sprite.
The dragon huffed, sending a warm breath that singe Raven’s eyeballs, drying them out completely. The swirl of the wind sent the fairy on a flight that orbited Raven’s head, causing the tiny winged creature to scold the dragon.
BEHOLD HUMAN… WE ARE TO BE YOUR GUIDES, continued Thur.
“Who are you?” asked Raven, directing his question to the glowing girl, ignoring anyone who stopped on the steps to give him a funny look.
I AM AIERA SPIRIT OF THE PURE LIGHT, Aiera replied.
DO YOU KNOW OF THE WRITING UPON THE WALL? Thur asked Raven.
‘Do you mean the wall that is in the palace?’ Raven asked. ‘Of course I know of the words of prophecy! Everyone knows that the prophecy is there and the sages have spent years trying to decipher its meaning.’
DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT MEANS LITTLE EARTH BROTHER? Aiera then asked of Raven.
‘I only know as much of the words that the sages have already managed to translate,’ Raven stated in reply.
WE ASK NOT IF YOU CAN SPEAK THE WORDS!! Thur boomed. DO YOU KNOW OF THE LINE WHICH ANNOUNCED THE ONE THAT SEARCHES FROM THE EAST?
THAT ONE MUST BE WELCOMED, added Aiera. WE MAKE YOU WELCOME NOW.
‘I don’t have time for this…’ Raven grumbled. Thoughts of his audience with the sages, the blade that he held, his father demoted and the signs of gambling rife in the city all came flooding through Raven’s mind.
JUST PONDER FOR A MOMENT, YOUNG ONE AND KNOW OUR WORDS ARE TRUTH, the fairy sighed before she winked out of existence.
THIS IS THE WILL OF THE GREAT GODDESS OF POSSIBILITY, Thur added.
‘I do not believe in your gods and goddesses and I certainly do not believe that the words of the prophecy are anything other than what the sages say,’ said Raven.
YOU MAY NOT BELIEVE IN THE LADY OF LUCK BUT SHE SURE BELIEVES A GREAT DEAL IN YOU EARTHLING, replied the great dragon before it flew back up to the blanket of stars in the night sky.
Raven watched it go, thankful that the experience was over. He saw a flicker of green light as the dragon vanished from his sight. As Raven shook his head in disbelief at what he had just experienced a gust of wind blew straight through his short spiky hair. JUST TRUST IN WHAT IS TO COME the wind whispered. Raven tried hard to ignore it.

The spirits thought for a moment to speak with the sylva that had summoned them. They felt the call of the goddess too strongly, asking them to come home. Both spirits considered waiting for the sleeping sylva to wake, but instead they followed the call; they had done what they could to help the human to fulfill his role in what was to come. The rest was up to the one known as the black bird. His cry would be heard, Thur hoped that the human’s were ready to listen.

The blue robed sage Simeon yawned and stretched his creaking joints as he sat at the table and eyed off the prophecy that he was surrounded by. This last hour was always the slowest and least exciting. Interested in the business of others, the sage hated that rarely did anyone come to visit the hall, when the time drew so close to curfew.
“Hello?”
Simeon stifled his yawn and smiled.
“Come forth and state your business…” the sage announced with confidence, as he had done all evening.
“I have come to record my business in Andrapaal, and that of my companion, a sylva girl named Paechra. I have been asked too, if I could see the council. My circumstances are of interest to you all, or so I have been told…” Raven said, solemnly.
“Indeed? Well, you will not be able to see the council tonight, they have retired already,” replied Simeon. “I will arrange for you to see the council tomorrow night, say at the seventh hour of the evening?”
“As you say, Your Wisdom,” replied Raven, turning away as the sage recorded what had been arranged.
Vladimir hovered in the dark shadow beneath the stairwell, partly encased by the wall so as he could not be seen. He had spent most of the evening cursing the names of Paechra and Raven as he waited, hour after hour, for the two figures to arrive. Each moment that the truth keeper did not appear, the sage of the silver sash worried about the magical locks that barred his door, the open tome revealing the criminal magic that he now so relied upon.
“Typical of a truth keeper to leave something of importance to the very last minute,” the sage murmured under his breath, when Raven finally did arrive. To Vladimir’s relief, the sylva Paechra, the one he was most concerned at seeing the prophecy again, was not present.
As the sage at the desk and the truth keeper talked, Vladimir risked a moment to think back on all the troubles Raven had caused him.
How the truth keeper had survived where others had died, was beyond Vladimir’s knowledge, it had surprised him greatly when news came from the border, of a wandering young truth keeper seeking a kidnapped sage and hot blooded revenge for fallen comrades. Vladimir had at first thought the boy was after him. The book had guided Vladimir then, sending magic induced storms and a party of vorsurk warriors.
When it became evident that the boy sought out only the vorsurk from the farm, Vladimir tried to call back both the fury of nature and the monsters he had unleashed. The sage had tried, but only with the strange magic of the storms had he succeeded. While Raven had turned back towards the city that was his home, Vladimir had watched this travel with great interest. That was until the sylva scholar had begun to make some strange discoveries in his translations of the prophecy. After that it had been a surprise to find both Paechra and Raven reaching Andrapaal together. It had been a surprise, and a great hindrance. Vladimir listened intently to what conspired between his fellow sage and the unknown truth keeper.
‘I must act and act now. My plans can still succeed. All must be different tomorrow,’ decided Vladimir.

“The seventh strike of the evening watch will suit me perfectly. My business is personal, a promise to my brethren that I have failed to fulfill, and a question I have about the lord truth keeper who now trains the young soldiers of this kingdom…” Raven stated gruffly, trying to hide the emotions that churned inside him. He had decided to leave the truth keeper ranks. The city he had sworn to protect, felt now like a place he no longer belonged. The brother truth keeper whose murders Raven had vowed to revenge he still felt he remained indebted to. The sage he hoped to rescue was probably dead many a year now. The father he hoped to make proud, had disowned him, and had been dishonored himself, somehow. The role of the truth keeper, one that had been a boyhood dream, had been lost to him, like his mother, and seemingly like his father had been lost to him.
As the son of a great, famous defender of truth, Raven had been a certainty to face the trials, a test given to the greatest student truth keeper before they left for life on the border. When the king had selected Raven amongst one hundred other youths, the dark haired boy impressed many senior truth keepers by his handling of the trials of honesty, faithfulness, courage and friendship. Raven became the youngest and fastest to complete the four tasks that led a boy to bear the blade, and the duty of the truth keeper. It seemed so sadly unfair to Raven that his childhood yearnings, hopes and dreams had led him in the end to this feeling of failure.
“And the sylva?” the sage asked, scribbling in the great tome as Raven spoke, oblivious to the storm of emotion that raged inside the truth keeper.
“She wishes to state that she seeks out her father, a resident here. She wonders do you know of the location of the city beneath,” Raven said.
The sage’s head snapped up. “What a strange request!” he exclaimed with a sour look. “I am not familiar with such a location as a city beneath…”
“I am sorry, Your Wisdom. I need rest…” Raven replied, dismissing himself then.
The sage snapped the tome shut, staring after the truth keeper as Raven turned and left.
“The youth today… Such strange ideas,” muttered Simeon as he shuffled off towards the palace library to shelve his tome.

Beneath the stairs Vladimir sighed in relief. Quietly he whispered the words of power, slipped back into the walls of the library and ventured upward to his office, concerned that the locks on his door no longer held.
‘Tomorrow I must see to it that we, the sages of blue, meet late. I must discover alone what it is that Raven plans…’ he thought to himself as he, like a spirit, floated through the palace.

Gregory marched through the halls of the palace filled to the brim with a determination to speak with Vladimir. Truth keepers familiar with the appearance of the citizen’s eleven on their way to the room of the silver sashed sage ignored the heavy set smithy and let him pass by them without question.
“Master!” Gregory shouted as he beat heavily and urgently upon the portal to Vladimir’s cell. He caught the breath stolen from him by the run from his forge to the palace, his eyes closed as the door swung wide open. It was this deep breath that saved Vladimir from discovery, enabling the sage to enter through the wall without the blacksmith seeing.
“Gregory!” Vladimir shouted, slamming the open tome shut as he spoke.
With cheeks flushed, Gregory, embarrassed, mumbled an apology.
“What has brought you to my home, blacksmith? We meet at your forge. That is a part of being one of the citizen’s eleven. And what is more, you are moments away from curfew. The embarrassment of having one of my own imprisoned… It is foolishness,” stated Vladimir, his anger obvious.
“Master Vladimir, please listen to me. What I have to tell you is most important and cannot wait until the dawn. There will be an arrest, but it will not be me…” replied the blacksmith.
“Well then Gregory… Speak!” Vladimir urged. He sought sleep, the tome had taken much of his energy and the sage had much planned for the next dawn. Sleep right now was almost a necessity.
“Um…” stuttered Gregory, the impatient stare of the powerful sage before him brought forth the remainder of the words that begged to bubble out. “The sylva that you asked me to host has cast a spell of magic, Your Wisdom… A spell I do not know the words for… But she did glow blue and the light around her got stronger and stronger and then she fell asleep and all the light around her disappeared. Do you think she knows that I was mean to her on purpose? Did Sarah tell her? Curse that seamstress. The word got out and now the sylva has used dark magic on me… If the swords aren’t ready when you need them we’ll know why then, won’t we..? Your Wisdom?” blurted out Gregory.
“Hush Gregory, hush my friend. Return to your place of rest. I trust in you that the blades will be ready in time. Speak to me more about Sarah tomorrow. I will come early and ask you questions. Empty your mind of these troubling thoughts. It is written that the most troubling of thoughts grants the least satisfactory slumber. I shall seek out rulings of this city concerning foreign spell casters. Fear not the sylva beneath your roof, no matter how poor a host you have been to her…” Vladimir laughed. It was the laugh of a young man in an older man’s form. Gregory noticed nothing though. His heart and head cleared of any worries; the blacksmith bid his master farewell and wandered home happily.
‘I have chosen well enough with that one,’ thought Vladimir to himself. ‘Perhaps it is far too easy for Gregory the Blacksmith to empty his mind.’
It was too late at night for Vladimir to contemplate such things. With the tome silent and tiredness claiming him Vladimir sank into pleasant slumber. The last thing he heard was the city bells tolling the twelfth hour. Curfew had begun.

The trainer and weapons keeper of all truth keepers of the kingdom, Raven’s father Michael Stormsong, walked the cobbled streets of greater Andrapaal in a daze. He had spent the last few hours, after his students had left, just cleaning the weaponry and sweeping the arena. The sun had set and true darkness had set in. The stars and moon shone brightly, but the light had not been enough for him to continue working there. Home was where the thoughts of his son haunted him. Johannas had returned, a whole ten years after the blue sage Vladimir had claimed he was dead. Why now, and for what reason his father would never know. With those foolish words, said in anger and surprise, the man had sent his son away again.
“Hey! You can’t come in here!” a ruff voice commanded as a heavy pair of hands grasped the trainer of truth keepers about the shoulders. The old man awoke from his dreary thoughts and looked up to see the sign of The Griffon with the Crimson Chest hanging outside the tavern he was about to enter into. It had been his regular place to drink, gossip, play cards before the sages had made it a form of taxation. While he had been training to be a truth keeper, newly wedded and with a child on the way, it was this tavern where he had chosen to meet his fellow comrades, before they headed out for their first battle. For years after he had returned and taken his place as a true Truth Keeper, protecting and policing Andrapaal’s streets, it was this same tavern where he had stopped each night before returning to the small manor that had been home, before, during and after his wife’s sickness and his son’s loss. After the second loss, the strange sage in the blue robes had hobbled into the city and announced the decimation of the small group of truth keepers that his son had been a part of, and suddenly he was no longer a lord. Suddenly his friends no longer wanted to know him and the places he had known as a part of his life were suddenly places he was barred to enter.
“Here… Let the old man in!” called the distinct cry of the barkeeper.
“Its Vladimir’s law..!” the ruffian at the door answered back, not releasing his grip.
“Which law of the great sage are you referring to? The curfew, or that the man is barred?” the barkeeper snapped back. In the single moment of exchange, the man who had been behind the bar was already at the door with his hand on the ruffian’s shoulder.
“I’ll see you tomorrow…” the ruffian murmured, giving Raven’s father a dirty look as he passed out the door and into the dark night.
“I would say time has treated you well, old man. A lie before drinks is a must. Not something you will find in any tome in the palace. Something of a different wisdom that my poppa taught me while I learnt his trade,” the barkeeper began, motioning to a bench where Michael was welcome to sit and rest.
The wood protested as the weapons trainer sat, but the bench held. A foaming mug of ale was placed before him. It was the fine, sweet smelling ale that the old man remembered as his favourite drink when the manor was his home.
“Truth of the Bear and Griffin…” the old man sighed. “I have not had a drop of this pass my lips since the day my son went away.”
“My father did say he missed your coinage. Since that youngster sage kicked you out of that home of yours, the other men found somewhere else to go. No one could tell a story like you, My Lord.” the barkeeper murmured.
“If only the same crowd was here to enjoy this tale.” Raven’s father laughed as he fished amongst his purse for the golden coin to pay. The barkeeper took the coin in silence and then began to close the tavern. The shadows of the night hid the old man drinking as the truth keepers walking the streets came past.
“For our own good…” the barkeep mumbled when the soldiers were out of ear shot. “Keeping us safe from the vorsurk wolves somehow…” he added to fill the silence.
The old man took another sip and sighed again.
“Benjamin, your father would be happy to know his son welcomed me like an old friend” said Michael gratefully.
“Two years past now. I was renamed Benjamin in his honour,” replied the barkeeper.
“Well then Benjamin. This is my tale for this evening. It has no vorsurk or any other monsters to speak of. There will be nothing as exciting as that. It is a short, but important tale, of a foolish old man and his poor, confused and innocent son,” the old man said sadly, a tear appearing at the corner of his eye.
“Lord Michael Stormsong… I look forward to the telling…” Benjamin said with a grin.
“He was only fourteen or fifteen, almost as young as you…” the old weapons master began.
“I’m at least twenty summers or more,” Benjamin protested, a boyish smile planted across his face as he enjoyed the joke and poured more of the golden liquid.
“Of course you are, but only when you get to my age do you have the right to interrupt your elder’s story,” replied Michael.
The two men laughed together, reminding Raven’s father of better times.
“As you wish then,” the old man continued with a broad grin. “Fifteen was my son’s age when he left me. I was bitter; he was all I had left after his mother passed when he was still a boy. It was not my place to raise him and it was his desire to follow in my footsteps and serve as yet another truth keeper…”
The old man painted a picture for his enrapt audience. The enthusiasm of his young son steered by a father who in turn was obsessed by a grief that consumed him, just as much as he was afraid of the backlash from his family and friends, the community, if he had shown even a glimpse of that very same grief. The successes of the son managed to cover the dark cloud of sadness that cast such a dark shadow over the father. And then, without warning, the son disappeared and the rumors sprouting about the family name were worse than the thoughts of his son’s death.
Benjamin sat in silence and listened. When either cup neared empty he filled it. As the story drew to an end he had a smile upon his lips but his eyes were deep in thought.
“This place is open to you anytime, old man. It would be what my father would want,” the barkeep stated.
“Aye, that would make him happy. I promise though, any other stories I plan to tell will again be those of high adventure. Such tales as you heard tonight only need to be told once. They are the tales that do not grow bigger and bolder with each retelling,” said Michael as he drained his cup.

Raven’s pounding feet could be heard easily by the small group of truth keepers that rounded the corner of the street he ran upon.
“Halt! State your business!” ordered one of the four armoured men.
Raven slowed to a walk and approached his brothers, offering his sheathed blade as he did.
“I am Raven Stormsong. Johannas Stormsong in this city, but beyond these walls it is a name I do not willingly carry,” he said.
The blade was pulled free and the insignia examined. Instantly, all four of the truth keepers were content with the blade and the statement. Silently Raven’s weapon was returned.
“Hurry home again, Johannas Stormsong. Curfew has begun and none are allowed to walk the streets again until the toll of the sixth hour,” one of the soldiers stated.
“It is certain your father will be anxiously awaiting your return,” the youngest of the four truth keepers added. It was obvious to Raven that memories of the weapon trainer, and possible thanks, were still fresh in the mind of this soldier freshly returned from battle with the vorsurk.
“You have my thanks. Where is it that my father would be living?” Raven asked meekly.
“It is the place beneath the pit of death. Has he not yet shown you the way?” the same truth keeper asked confused.
“I have another place to stay for now, arranged by the sage of the silver sash. I shall see my father tomorrow. Perhaps he will show me his home then,” Raven stammered.
Satisfied, the truth keepers moved on.
It was thus that Raven returned to his bed to find both Gregory and Paechra in deep slumber. Moments later, sleep claimed him also. High above, a young black dragon and a fairy of light watched over the truth keeper, fascinated by the dramas surrounding the human that they had been asked to monitor.

Vladimir grumbled to himself as he forced his old frame at a marching pace through the tunnels beneath Andrapaal. Each right and left turn led his flickering torch passed scores more of jumbled chaos, more of that cursed prophecy of which the few sentences that the sages had been able to translate, had all spelt doom for Vladimir’s past and present, and most definitely spelled both disaster and failure for the future that Vladimir envisioned, with him and his brother sages firmly placed at the kingdom’s helm.
At last, the final two twists and turns and Vladimir was standing before his prisoner.
The old sylva looked every single one of its ancient years. To Vladimir it looked as though he stood before a weeping willow, all gnarled and bent at uncomfortable angles. When first the sylva had arrived in the kingdom, Vladimir recalled the stout birch that the sylvan master of languages had seemed to be.
“Ahhhh, Vladimir, my captor. Such a late hour I assume. So nice of you though to visit a poor, truthfully ancient… man,” the sylva laughed.
“Your daughter!..” Vladimir began. He was surprised to see such a smile upon such a ragged face.
“Yes… She worries about me so. She is so young still to be out amongst the world. Hidden down here by you there is only so much a father can do protect his youngest child,” the sylva sage replied, his face as straight as an arrow shaft, and yet, Vladimir could sense the menace that hid just below the surface of both the face and the voice of his prisoner.
“Your daughter has cast magic in our kingdom, a kingdom that looks upon magic as an abomination and a crime,” Vladimir continued, stating the laws he knew by heart in a more relaxed tone. The sage Vladimir did not expect the outburst that confronted him next.
“Ha! You jest, Vladimir, Morthos, or whoever it is you are in true form. I see a young man who walks like his grandfather. You speak of my daughter committing a crime against your kingdom. What is it that you do daily, hourly, each tiny second of your short existence?” the sylva stated indignantly.
“…” said Vladimir, his mouth agape with no words to fill the opening.
“You will banish my daughter,” continued Paechra’s father Therdous. “It takes no magic to see that there is chaos brewing in your streets. I know not why my daughter has come here, except to visit her father who has long been missed from his forest home. I know not either how it is my daughter fell into your silly prophecy that some mad man scrawled for you all. I could spend the remainder of my own life, at least four of yours, telling you and your brethren what I have discovered from the writings above me and from what I can see in this tunnel you hide me in…”
“Yes! Yes! Tell me everything!” Vladimir exclaimed, interrupting the sylva with not only the words he spoke, but also the obvious childlike dazzle in his eager eyes.
“But I won’t, can you not see the impossibility of what you ask of me? Banish my daughter and I will tell you what I know of the lioness and the raven and the supposed end of your darkness…”

After returning to his room exhausted, Vladimir slept. The hours he had spent with the sylva had been most enlightening. It was somewhat troubling, but Vladimir felt his mind empty as the need for slumber became too much. For the first time in days the voices did not disturb him. The old man was at peace. As he slept, his other self, his real self crept back into his thoughts. As the old man slept, the younger man’s dreams came to him.

Morthos sat at his simple pine desk. A desk that was identical to all the other desks that filled the great lecture theatre. It was where he sat, dressed in the flowing robes of yellow that identified him as a scholar in training, a Knowledge Seeker. Over the heads of forty other such students of his age, Morthos watched and listened to the lecture coming from the animated Knowledge Speaker that spoke before them all. Many of the students had already turned their attention to creating fancy borders about their parchment, or scrawling messages of young man wisdom in the black ink with their quills, hoping to educate or communicate with fellow students that had become bored with what the sages in red were trying to teach. In a world where the written word was held sacred and was always believed, idle gossip of this nature would nearly always have a dramatic effect.
Earlier on in the lecture, Morthos had become disengaged, at the fault of the lecturer this time. It was difficult to focus upon a voice, that did not once, vary in pitch. Suddenly though, a tingle moved up Morthos’ spine like an icy hand had caused him to wake.

Vladimir smiled in his sleep, knowing fully well what was to come.

“Vorsurk!” the lecturer had cried. Morthos had listened. Not so much interested in the rules that had governed the everyday life of his fellow citizens, the student sage pricked up his ears as the lecturer began to explain the relationship that The Kingdom of Thuraen had with its nemesis. Since the first recorded history of the kingdom, war with the lupine vorsurk was a known fact. Sometimes a skirmish with those other magical, mystical beings, the sylva, would erupt. Like the wick that lit the street torches each night, this battle with those creatures from the forests would be quite quickly extinguished, not left to burn as the war with the vorsurk had been. The red robe of the Knowledge Speaker flowed like a living creature as the man’s voice suddenly became alive as he spoke of the enemy.
“Their sorcerers have access to dark and powerful magicks. Wizardry stolen from books and scrolls, a soulless, ungoverned type of writing that is forbidden to all!” the knowledge speaker announced. “It is written by the great sage Hyra-Annon of the White Beard that any whom does touch the black covers would wish they wise and brave enough to tame the powers, or wish the birth they had to cease and be no more…”
After writing these words in bold type beneath a half finished sentence concerning merchant laws, Morthos began to think.
The sage in yellow had no respect for the red robed lecturers. Rarely did he see the irony that it was the yellow robed sages of that time who taught the next yellow robed youngsters. The red robed sages that taught them then became the blue robed decision makers of the city. Like many of his fellow students, Morthos dreamed of wearing the robes of blue.
“Sir?!” Morthos asked, his quill poised as he stopped midway though scribbling down just how he was going to gain a vorsurk magic tome.
The blustering lecturer gasped and turned a deep shade of red, almost identical to his clothing. He scanned the ocean of yellow robes to identify the interruption.
“Stand up boy! I wish to see you!” the teacher ordered.
Morthos stood as bidden. As a sage, just like the novice soldiery truth keepers were taught, Morthos knew the rules of politeness and respect.
“What is your question, boy?”
The ocean of yellow all turned towards Morthos as the sage took a steadying breath.
“What is the role of the king in our kingdom? You have so thoroughly outlined how shaman sorcerers hold sway over the barbaric vorsurk. What role does the king play in a kingdom where we, the sages, govern?” asked Morthos.
“Sit down boy. I shall excuse the interruption because the question is superb,” stated the sage.
Morthos once again paid complete attention as the lecture continued. The more he listened, the more he realized, the role of chief sage, and possible ruler of the kingdom, relied upon him getting that tome. In a year he would graduate. Morthos decided he would demand to spend time beyond the kingdom. The vorsurk borders begged for more sages. Morthos would go out as a yellow robed sage, hoping to return, not as a red robe to speak to children in a hall. Morthos sought only the bluest robe of all. Morthos sought the robe that came with the silver sash. From there it would only be a matter of time. The young mind of Morthos scratched down another of the kingdom’s laws upon his parchment: The death of an heirless king gave complete rule to the Chief of all Sages.

Vladimir awoke, recharged and well rested. He almost felt like he was Morthos again. The sage frowned, shaking his head vigorously until that idea had been thrown free. He had too much to do, too many things to think about for such nonsense to reside in his mind. He had slept, and surprisingly well too.
“Chaos in our streets indeed…” the sage pondered. It seemed in the grey light of the dawn that things had become clear to the sage. Johannas was a lost soul, straying too far from the path Vladimir wished him to tread. He had brought the female sylva, her influence had been the boy’s undoing. Now he was only good for one purpose. Pieces of a devious plan began to gather in Vladimir’s mind. Morthos was still there, still scheming, still thirsting for the greatest power that the kingdom offered.

Another swig of the burning liquid found its way down Thomas’ throat as he contemplated the how of replacing another dead worker. Feeding upon the life of the city, it was easy for Thomas to be happy go lucky during the day. It was the dark times as the sun drifted away that caused Thomas to head below his house into the cellar in desperate search for the whiskey drink he hid away amongst the carcasses of his livelihood. The butcher knew that it would not take much to gather another three young men to his slaughter pit, but the alcohol that swirled about his thoughts caused him to imagine them in the place of the cattle. Such was the benefits of being one of Vladimir’s eleven, seen in the community as of high standing, the next step closer to the minds and decisions of the palace and the sages. It was a tough role for Thomas to fulfill, a difficult position for someone who felt he had not earned the privilege. For all that Vladimir had seen in Thomas when he chose the man for such a role, Thomas could only ever recognise the private space where secret meetings could be kept secret, where information could be kept contained and not become instant gossip.

***

The vorsurk peered beyond the oak branches, green and strong branches during the summer months. The beast grinned as it spied what it sought, deep down in the heart of the valley. As it let the branches, thick and lush with leaves, settle back into place it licked its wide, dark tongue thrice over its sharp pearly fangs. They had arrived, and as the sorcerer had promised, the great human city looked like it held more than enough females and slaves for each warrior to have five hundred times their share. Eagerly the scout scampered off from his post to personally give the mighty sorcerer the excellent news.

***

Michael let the axe fall naturally, as it had a few thousand times before. The trainer of the truth keepers, teacher of the fighting force of the whole of Thuraen sweated in the heat of the midmorning sun. It was to be a warm day, an average summer day with little breeze to relieve it. The high walls of Andrapaal tended to keep the heat in, great during the cooler months, not so when the weather grew stiflingly warm. That was when Michael was thankful he no longer resided in the great mansion of a house he had shared with his wife and son Johannas when he had been a cherished lord. Now that he was trainer of the truth keeper force he had a new residence beneath the arena. He tended to the entertainers, both the unfortunate animals and the just as unfortunate prisoners. Beneath the dusty pit where so called justice was performed, Michael lived with those entertainers he tended, and he knew, just how life sapping the cold was down there all year through. So the axe fell again and again, down upon the large logs that Michael found in the nearby forest. Once a lord, now disgraced, he befriend prisoners and gladiators alike all who the sages had marked for death for whatever reason. Michael saw it as his duty now to do what he could to make the lives of the imprisoned more comfortable. All Michael could manage was the same standard of living as that of the young boys training under his care. No better, no worse, it was the best Michael could offer. The inmates ate when the student truth keepers ate. He prepared the same oat porridge for the prisoners to eat as Michael still had friends in the barracks kitchen. The same type of blanket that each truth keeper was given when they first joined the brotherhood also appeared in the arena cells. Michael had gathered up a number of such blankets in his years as a guardian of the kingdom. He thought, as he chopped, of the strange return of his almost forgotten son. It was the dark haired boy that had truly raised his father to the honoured lordship, the same child that had brought such woe upon the family’s name.
A call from not far away brought Michael’s mind back to the present. The old man smiled at the irony as he called back his reply.
“You have found me again my son,” Michael said. “Come join me as I chop the lumber for the day.”
To have such a visit on this morning did not surprise the man. The dark haired boy had finally found where his father had been banished.

“Raven?! Raven?!” called Paechra as she rose from her slumber. She dressed and checked outside the forge doorway. The continual thud of Gregory’ hammer on the steel he forged told Paechra exactly where she could find the blacksmith. Raven was not there however, and the eagle-like eyes of the sylva girl already spied Thomas and Sarah headed straight towards them.
“Gregory! Where is Raven?!” Paechra called over her shoulder at the blacksmith.
The burley bear-like man paused with his hammer raised and looked briefly straight at Paechra. There was a grunt and a shrug of his shoulders and then the hammer continued its rhythmic tune. Seething, Paechra turned on her heel and strode out to meet the two hosts.
“Where is..!” Thomas called, his sentence fading into nothingness as Paechra brought a finger to her lips.
As the three of them got far enough away from Gregory’ pounding that they could be heard, Thomas asked again; “Where is Raven this morning?”
“Honestly I don’t know. That blacksmith has given me nothing but animal noises this morning. Noises that not even a real animal would understand…” Paechra replied with a shrug.
“With that exotic beauty of yours, you’re lucky you get more than animal noises from this man…” Sarah laughed, indicating the butcher that stood beside her. “I doubt any citizen who has stayed all their life in our fine city could string together more than two words when standing beside a fey woman.”
Thomas had a face that resembled shock and despair as well as infant like innocence, but in an instant the butcher showed the sylva and the seamstress his broadest smile and he laughed. In the tradition of all butchers, the laugh was quite infectious.
“No matter,” Thomas continued, with mirth still present in his voice. “Raven shall just miss out on the great day we have planned for you.”
“Would it be too much if I requested that we see the poor victim of the accident?” Paechra asked.
Thomas’ humour faded. His face paled as the horrific accident of the previous day came back to his thoughts. As a representative of Vladimir’s Citizen’s Eleven, the butcher was trying hard to keep his mind on the job of tour guide. The words of the sylva who he was supposed to be minding, sent all those dreaded feelings flooding back.
“I couldn’t…” the butcher stammered, suddenly uncertain.
Sarah grasped him quickly by the shoulder, afraid that in the summer heat even the butcher was about to faint. The seamstress’ grip would never let any man fall. Thomas visibly grimaced as Sarah squeezed tighter, the pain bringing him back to the present.
“The poor man did not make it through the night, did he?” Paechra asked soothingly.
Suddenly both women could see the strain on Thomas’ face, the deep dark bags he had hidden from around his eyes, the sadness he had kept secret with his booming laugh and catchy smile.
“At least take me to the family. There is nothing more can be done for the dead… The living left behind need our time now. The joyous day you both have planned can wait,” Paechra added kindly.
“The boy did indeed survive the night, though in truth I do not know how,” Thomas explained as he took the hands of both the women and grimly led the way.

“So this is your sleeping quarters?” Raven asked meekly as he followed his father on a different tour of the city.
“Cool in summer and cooler in winter. The fire keeps burning all year through, something that the previous trainer neglected to make certain happened,” Michael, the trainer of the truth keepers replied as he hefted another small log upon the burning blaze. “It keeps me and all the inmates who live beneath the city as warm and as comfortable as is possible…” Raven’s father explained.
Raven nodded in understanding. “Do you enjoy your work?”
“Certainly!” Michael replied in alarm. “It may not be the lavish living I deserve as a past truth keeper. It may not be the kingly existence that I wanted for you and your mother… No it is not my life of the past. It is a poorer existence than that, but it is the existence I accept as my own,” the old man explained.
“I can understand the truth of that…” Raven replied thoughtfully.
“Johannas my son, would you please return to the surface with me?” his father begged, “My head throbs from last night’s lateness, but the delightful sunshine does much to ease those aches and others,” the trainer added.
“It is indeed a gift not offered to these other unfortunates who are sent by the sages to live beneath the arena,” Raven murmured to himself as he followed his father back out to the city above.

Vladimir peered over the black tome and strained his eyes to make out the swirling symbols. The dream he’d had, inspired the sage, and for the first time since he had obtained the cursed tome, Vladimir was going to contact the vorsurk who’d given him the gift.
“Kaa-a-kaa, ishmeillella, Karakk. Ishmeillella, Karakk. KARAKK!!!” Vladimir chanted, screeching the final rune as the forest of The Vale of History exploded into his mind. When Vladimir saw something so close to his home and his city, the sage panicked. The old man strained with the book he still felt in his hands, struggling to close it.
“You come and approach me, pesky worm?” growled the voice of the vorsurk beast in Vladimir’s ear.
“I… I have a plan! The city can be mine another way!” stammered Vladimir urgently.
“We too have plans… Speak human and we shall see just how your plan and our plan will work together…” the wolfish monster growled.
“I wish to return your gift. I need the tome of magic no longer. I can take my own form again, once the truth keeper has been framed for the deaths I need done…” Vladimir blurted out, quicker than he wanted.
“YOU THINK THE BOOK WAS A GIFT!!! Kaa-azzarra-ATHU!!!” the vorsurk roared.
A searing pain struck Vladimir as if his old frail form had been clouted by a blacksmith’s hammer. The sage released the book and clutched his temples, feeling blood, his blood, running slowly down his cheeks. The forest vanished from his thoughts and the pain suddenly disappeared. Above Vladimir on his desk, the sage heard the pages of the black tome flap quickly in the windless room. They stopped on a page near the end of the tome and then the vorsurk warrior was standing in the room before the cowering sage.
“Foolish human, that book was no gift,” the beast whispered harshly. “It took me years of cunning and courage to slay the great wizard who owned such a book. It was given to you to aid us in our conquest. Now payment is due! We are closer than you think, worm.”
The vorsurk spat, the disgusting glob of saliva hissing as it hit the sage’s robe, burning a small hole into the fiber. And then the beast vanished. Left alone, Vladimir heard the tome snap shut. He then wept silent tears. They were tears of fear, but more than that, they were tears of frustration. He rose from the floor and steeled his emotions. In anger he brushed the tome from his desk along with a small pile of papers. The tome fell open to a powerful spell. It was one that harnessed the burning heat of the sun. Vladimir smiled grimly as he began to make out the runes. He was starting to form another idea, one that could possibly save his precious city, and still give him what he most desired. Little did Vladimir realize, the vorsurk, for a brief moment more was still watching.

Thurzuk let his magic spirit self return to his resting body. The sage had seen the spell that the vorsurk had wanted him to see. Thurzuk braced himself for the day he had ahead. The sun was already closing quickly upon the mark for midday. The fuzziness would take hours to clear from his mind this time. That left only the darkness of night for the vorsurk who acted as sorcerer to prepare his spells and prepare his army. The dark of night was Thurzuk’s favourite time. There were fifteen warriors, himself included that had lasted from the original one hundred and twenty-one warriors he had taken with him from the city of Geokastn, the powerful number of eleven multiplied by that same holiest of numbers. That would make his remaining fifteen fighters four warriors too many for the spell he had planned. Thurzuk tried to work through the cloud of fog that attacked his mind as he felt the physical form of his true self again. Giving up as the same name came around and around in his mind, the vorsurk let sleep take him. What he needed was rest from spells, and rest from the whining of the pups and whiners he had gathered to his banner as soldiers. They would have their reward soon. Ten of them would. For the spell to work there could only be eleven. For eleven was the vorsurk number of power.

“Feel here!” Paechra demanded gruffly of Thomas the butcher. They were in one of the many small homes that belonged to the sages of Andrapaal. The occupation of the dwelling was granted to the hard working citizens in repayment for the positions they held and the work that they did to help the city and the kingdom run. This was all explained to Paechra in quick and simple terms; “No work. No home.”
The sylva could see the fear in the eyes of Anna, Daniel’s wife as she nursed an infant at her breast and listened to Thomas the butcher as he introduced Paechra. The druid did what she could for the wife with especially chosen soothing words but she focused most of her attention on the patient. Daniel was a butcher’s hand, almost a boy who had learnt the skills of his father and been apprenticed to Thomas. Now Paechra and Thomas were in the third room of the house, the sleeping quarters, where they both knelt beside the body. Daniel had been all wrapped in woven cloth, soaked from his blood. The body looked to Paechra like it was prepared for burial. Sarah was in the eating area, consoling the weeping Anna.
“Feel here!” the sylva repeated, this time it was more an order than a request.
Thomas did as he was bid, touching the bloodied chest of Daniel with great reluctance.
“The boy is passed the ability of our known medicines,” Thomas pleaded, squirming. Daily, the butcher was covered from head to foot in the blood and gore of animals. When it was a fellow human, especially a fellow butcher, Thomas was much less comfortable.
“Faint pulsing heart… It would be possible to bring this child back… The whole forest may perish… What would we bring him back to though..?” Paechra murmured to herself, ignoring Thomas’ comment, she was focused upon listening to the body that the butcher had declared beyond help.
“Thomas please can you take Anna somewhere safe, to family or friends?” urged Paechra. “What I plan to attempt may cause her distress if she sees.”
“What are you planning, Paechra?” Thomas asked concerned at what he may witness. “Fear not butcher I plan to try and save this child,” replied the sylva. “And after you have spoken with Sarah I need you to purchase what ever shrubs, plants, weeds, trees, all the small plants you can sweet talk from the markets… Hurry up and go!!! If you want your boy or who ever he is to you to remain intact you’ll need to move quickly. That whole day yesterday you knew about this and refused my help… You owe this to Anna and the little baby. Use every ounce of speed you have in you.”
“As you wish…” Thomas replied. His mouth closed upon the arguments forming in his mind, and he left without another word.
As Paechra heard the butcher go she called out loudly for the seamstress Sarah.
“How may I be of assistance?” Sarah asked, her head peering in the doorway to the sleeping chamber. Paechra marveled at the silence of the seamstress, but only for a moment.
“Have you seen death before, Sarah?” Paechra asked.
“Yes… Too many times…” Sarah sighed.
“Gather up what blankets and strips of cloth you can find,” Paechra urged.
“I’ll go past work and get the girls to help if there is not enough here, and see what old blankets or anything similar I have on hand there,” Sarah replied.
Paechra nodded at the suggestion.
“I too have seen death, too many times. With teamwork, speed and the willing spirits it may not be today that we need see death again. Go, and quickly… Gather what you can…” she said.
And with that, Paechra and Daniel were alone. Sarah turned just before she left the home and saw a faint blue light emanating from the place where the body lay. The seamstress shook her head, bemused. As the portal clicked closed behind her, she sped off as quickly as her form allowed. There had been no blankets or sheets in the house, nothing that was not already covered in blood. Sarah rushed home, back to the seamstresses, wondering what it was she had seen, and just what it was she would witness this day.

Raven and his father stood where they had last parted, where Michael had disowned his son in front of his students.
“Throw this spear at that water barrel, the one of dark oak that is half full. I will prove that you are no longer a citizen of this fine city…” Michael stated, pointing out the target.
Raven shrugged and took the offered shaft. He launched it as he had seen so many of the vorsurk throw such a shaft at him, as he had thrown so many similar spears at a fleeing lupine beast when the fight was almost done. Raven threw it with all his strength focusing upon the barrel that his father had indicated. The wooden shaft cracked as it struck the centre of the barrel with great force. Instantly the barrel began to leak its content, moments later it broke apart, leaving a large puddle in the dirt, the sun drying up the water slowly. Raven was quite proud of the throw, but like all other truth keepers he kept him emotions in check.
“See?” Michael announced, the throw proving his point. “We are sword people. Only one of the savage vorsurk could score such a hit as you just now…” declared Raven’s father.
Raven was not sure what it was he had said to upset his father, but the older man had changed dramatically. It was like it had been earlier; when Gregory had shown Raven the arena as part of his grand tour. The trainer of truth keepers had been strange then, when Raven had discovered his father’s new employment. Raven decided he had received enough poor hospitality.
“Father what troubles you so? Any truth keeper who had fought alongside his brother against our enemies could easily learn the art of the spear. Yes, we are sword people and anyone who willingly would carry a spear or hammer or club as a weapon would be labeled an enemy of the kingdom. I carry a sword. Is this about your armour? Your chainmail, gifted to me?” Raven asked.
“What if it is Johannas? I see you carry your sword, as poorly kept as the scabbard is…” Michael argued back.
“Father, call me Raven… Please, I beg of you. I have not been Johannas for ten long years,” requested Raven.
“If that is so then you must call me Michael. I have been neither lord, nor your father for that same many years…” Raven’s father spat back.
Raven sighed and took a deep breath. Now was the time to tell his father all the things that he wished the old man could have experienced with him.
“That day… All those years ago, it still haunts me…” Raven said mournfully.
Raven’s father just nodded, letting his son continue.
“I followed where the sages led us, we all did,” Michael’s son continued. “The desert was harsh to march across, but I was lucky to not yet have been sent east to serve upon the border, needing to find a way to live amongst the sand and flies.”
“To serve upon the border is a great honour,” injected Michael.
“And an honour I would have experienced if we had not visited that farm…” said Raven in his defence.
As the truth keeper explained about the dead he had seen and about the sage that was with him, Morthos of the yellow robes, he could see his father becoming more agitated. When Raven finally ended his short but sorry tale with the death of Vladimir, his son’s vow, and the stolen robes, Raven’s father broke his silence.
“Why would you tell your father all of these lies Raven?!” demanded his father. “The book of Vladimir clearly states that you were the one that led those poor souls into the ambush. Only the sage Vladimir of the blue robes escaped! He was welcomed into the city as the new silver sash. The sage you say you buried is Vladimir the Young. I have a kingdom full of citizens that would tell you that Vladimir the Young is quite alive and well.”
“That is impossible!” Raven shouted, his certainty pierced like the water barrel.
“That is impossible?! What is impossible is that I had thought for a moment you’d returned to ask me for my forgiveness. You are right, without the chain armour I gave you and the sword you have at your side,” stated Michael. “You are unworthy to be a truth keeper or a member of even this fallen family that birthed you. Return now to whatever hole it was you vanished into all those years ago. You are a liar and a disgrace. If it is not already written then it should be.”
“Father please?!” Raven sighed, but his father ignored his pleas.
“I feel the shame you have brought to our name. It gladdens me to know that you cannot read what great things they wrote of your predicted future…” Michael spat, his anger obvious.
Saddened, Raven watched his father turn and storm away.
“Surely that cannot be true,” Raven whispered. “Surely it is these poor conditions that cause my father so much anger. To have such a smear upon our family name… a lie at that. Such a lie would not survive… The ink would dry partway through the writing. Such a thing would not be possible…”
Confused and concerned, Raven left the arena in search of Paechra or Gregory, or anyone else who could help him make sense of such madness. It was then that he thought of the lady of fate. If there truly was a god of fortune and she had her eyes focused upon him then maybe… just maybe there was a way to use Vladimir’s game of dice against him. A plan began to form in Raven’s mind. Perhaps he did believe in the lady of luck after all.

Vladimir paced his office. The small cubicle did not leave the sage much space to march about, but from his closed portal, past his large desk, the small fire place, library shelf, and then to the foot of his bed was a well worn course that Vladimir strode when he was thinking deeply.
‘It is a well known verse that what is written is truth. It is what was preached, it is what we tell ourselves and each other. Was it not written… that very fact?’ Vladimir thought to himself over and over in his mind. ‘But could it be possible that such truths were written with false words? What of any falsities written with words worshipped as true? Could there be false truths? What if there were truths that were flawed, ringing false as they were spoken? What if there were no truths and everything was made false in the writing or the saying of it… or both?’
As his foot lightly touched the bed’s end again another thought broke through to the sage’s troubled mind. ‘Of course, it was all ridiculous though… It was not what was written that was the truth. It was, as it always had been, what was announced, and so much more importantly what was believed that was truth. Only when it had become a belief, something accepted by the band of sages that protected the writings of the people so carefully, did anything ever get recorded into the tomes of truth.’
This thought made the sage smile in relief. It was up to Vladimir to twist the facts that he was to present to his brethren in blue, so that his statement would be impossible to be disbelieved. Acceptance had been the key all along.
‘First though, I must speak with that blacksmith. We must gather the eleven,’ Vladimir thought to himself. As he peered down at his feet, to the open tome, he smiled a faint smile. The spell that harnessed the powerful sun still stared at the sage from the open pages. ‘We have much to discuss, the eleven and I…’ the sage added as his smile grew broader.
The sage’s pacing continued for a few more minutes before Vladimir opened wide his portal and stepped out into the corridor. Vladimir knew where to find Gregory; he only needed to follow the sound of the hammer blows.

“And what need pray tell, does a butcher have with so much shrubbery?” laughed the merchant gardener as he gently placed the fourth crate of fragrant herbs into the waiting arms of Thomas. This crate was gently put on top of the other three precariously placed crates that already filled the butcher’s burley arms.
“No time to talk,” barked back Thomas.
“No time to barter either,” the merchant chuckled as he took the offered golden coins that Thomas held out in the flat of his hand. The instant the coins were taken, Thomas fought for a better grip on the bottom of the four boxes he carried.
“Enjoy it! You’ll not rip me off like this again…” the butcher swore, taking off from the market as quickly as his load and the market crowed allowed him to travel.
“Perhaps he’s trying a new diet upon the cattle?” the merchant thought. The question hung in the air for only a second before he counted the coins again and laughed. With a satisfied smile the money was secured away and the merchant began his cry again.
“Finest herbs! Finest plants! Finest you will ever see..!”

“Gregory! When do the games begin? What night? I feel I have a plan that may see my father and I reunited…” Raven panted as he came upon the blacksmith, tools down, resting in the shade of the forge.
“Raven, everyone has been looking for you! Where did you hide on this fine summer day?”
“Gregory my friend, wonderful host and guide to the city I had nigh almost forgotten. I went to the arena. I went there to see my father.”
The blacksmith smiled inwardly as his hopes soared that the truth keeper would finally accept his role in the city once more. The master Vladimir was going to be pleased, if this were indeed the case.
“The games begin at dusk, officially. They are run, unofficially from midday. There is always someone in the fine city that has a set of dice and a small pile of money they are willing to part with. If you feel the touch of luck right now I have a feeling there is something I may be able to arrange…” Gregory replied, holding his breath as he awaited an answer.
“Nay, I wish only to play and win by the rules. This city has changed in many ways since I left it. I want it to accept me as I am, on its own terms.”
“As you wish, truth keeper…” Gregory murmured with a grin.
‘I hope this is what you are planning too, lady luck,’ Raven thought, something he kept to himself.

Thomas forced open the portal to the home of Daniel and Anna awkwardly. The third lot of stacked boxes he was delivering from the market made it impossible for him to use his hands on the knob and so he forced it open with a combined effort from one elbow and a knee. As the door swung inward the butcher was not confronted by the jungle of herbs and plants he was expecting. Nor did the smell of blood and death invade his nostrils and remind him of his workplace. Thomas entered the dark house in a state of confusion. There was no smell, no scent of fragrant plant life, and no stench of festering wounds.
“Sarah? Paechra? Are you here?” Thomas called. There was uncertainty evident in his voice.
“Leave those boxes where you stand Thomas and hurry in to here…” commanded Sarah, beckoning for the butcher to do as she’d said and without delay. The look on the seamstress’ face was one of wonder and amazement.
Without understanding why, Thomas dropped the boxes to the floor as best he could and only spilling them a little. In those few moments after he had arrived, Thomas’ eyes had adjusted to the gloom. He noted as he stepped over the mess he’d made of broken boxes, soil and plant, that more empty crates littered the floor of that first room of the house. There was no sign though of the plants he had purchased with his own money.
The seamstress shook her head and brought her calloused finger to her lips.
“Go quietly… The sylva and the apprentice are sleeping…”
“Is he dead?” Thomas whispered, his face going ashen white with the horrible thought.
Sarah laughed quietly and shook her head. With that she turned with more grace than her figure should have allowed, and quietly made her way deeper into the house.
“This is truly impossible!” Thomas cried out in shock as he entered the sleeping chamber where he had left his apprentice Daniel to die in comfort. It had only been a day since the boy was in such a poor state, maybe less. Now, before Thomas’ own eyes, the boy was sitting up, quietly sleeping. The sylva Paechra was silent also. Her head was at rest upon Daniel’s chest. Her blonde hair was sprayed out like an open fan, covering the wound. She knelt at her patient’s side, exhausted from her morning’s work. Strewn throughout the chamber were plants stripped of their greenery, just stems and roots, dead plants each and everyone of them.
The question ‘How?’ caught in Thomas’ throat. The noise he made sounded similar to the snort of a pig. At such a strange noise both the sleepers awoke.
“Master Thomas. Have you come to visit me?” asked Daniel meekly, after he covered a yawn.
“No… He has just come to see me with a final delivery. Then he has a butchery to run,” Paechra cut in before Thomas could reply.
“The goods you requested are in the front room. The boxes broke but I can possibly bring them in, a few plants at a time,” Thomas stammered, his voice returning to him after a quick cough cleared it.
“No, leave them. Sarah and I can do such a task. Daniel is healthy enough that he can be without me by his side for such a short time,” replied the sylva.
“It shall be as you wish then, Paechra. I shall return to the slaughter house. Next time a man of mine is near death though I will remember your name,” said Thomas with a bow.
Paechra nodded in silent agreement.
“Shall I fetch Anna though? Or at least tell her some happy news?” Thomas enquired over his shoulder as he stepped out the room.
“Oh yes,” Paechra laughed. “I’d almost forgotten her. Please pass on the message that her husband needs her care. The best care for healing is a lover’s smile and a friend’s touch. Fever from the wound has passed and the wound has healed. I have done what I can. With any luck you will have a strong, healthy, much wiser apprentice on hand tomorrow morn to help you catch up on the demands for your wares.”
“Back to work so early?!” said Daniel and Thomas together.
Paechra nodded to both men with a soft smile.
“I do believe I speak the truth. A fine steak meal this evening will leave you ready for the day’s labour. I can see naught but hunger preventing you from a fine day’s work,” Paechra replied.
The sylva heard Thomas and Sarah whispering in earnest as the seamstress led the butcher out. Paechra smiled to herself a weary smile.
“How?” Thomas finally found he was able to ask.
“Miracles… Many, not just one…” the seamstress whispered with the excitement of a child. “I curse and spit that a sage were not nearby to capture to parchment the moments I’ve witnessed,” continued the seamstress.
As Daniel drifted into a peaceful and healing sleep Paechra smiled a secret smile. It was a smile of satisfaction, but even more so it was a smile of exhaustion. Sarah could handle the plants herself. Paechra allowed her teardrop shaped eyes to close.

Gregory just took up the hammer of his labour once more when again he was interrupted.
“Blacksmith! I pray you have a moment to pause and speak with me.” Vladimir said, his voice clearer than his aged skin said it should have been.
“Your Wisdom… I was not… I mean, I was, but only…” Gregory blubbered at the unexpected visit.
“Of course it was as you say, Gregory. Is it not written, and therefore of truth, that he who works from the sun’s rise to the sun’s death does die too when darkness falls,” Vladimir replied, waving the blacksmith into an embarrassed silence.
“I am your man, great sage,” Gregory managed, after a pause allowed the blacksmith to overcome his awkwardness.
“Please good blacksmith; it is your duty to gather the eleven of this fine city,” the sage instructed. “We meet at the place of Thomas the butcher as we always do, this time we need to meet at the seventh hour of the evening. Spread the word and gather the representatives. I have much to discuss with you all.”
“I have much to tell you also, master. The truth keeper following the strange path of the raven may well be returning to our ways once more,” replied Gregory.
At the mention of Raven, Vladimir shivered. It was a strange sensation for the sage to suffer in both the heat of the forge and that of the summer season. Gregory, noticing nothing, continued to wear his childish smile of excitement.
“Continue with your work for this beloved city, blacksmith. The rogue truth keeper is one of the many things I wish to discuss with the eleven. I must address my brothers in blue now. The sun is already far too high up in the sky. Oh, and blacksmith… I was never here…”
As Vladimir dismissed himself, he noted that Gregory had already returned to his hammering. The pounding jarred down the sage’s spine at each and every step that Vladimir took. The sun was truly already too far gone in the day for the sage’s liking. He did have to see his fellow sages in blue. A few thoughts were coming together in Vladimir’s mind of just how he would convince the ones he called brother, that both the sylva and the raven haired boy were a disaster for the city. Before he could face that crowd of old fools though, he had another fool to visit. This one he had to see about a horse. The sylva would not need the beast any longer. The sage of the silver sash was determined to have steak for dinner. The watchman rang the bell to state that it was already the second hour of the afternoon. The sage, Vladimir hurried on, he still had much to accomplish on this day.

“I offer you great thanks, my lady of holy truths and miracles!!” Anna bubbled as she burst into the room where Paechra and Daniel slumbered, waking them both instantly.
“What are you..?” Paechra began before a gigantic yawn interrupted her speech.
“Thomas told me everything. Some sort of miracle… The truth should be praised! Not only do I keep my husband but we keep our house too. Mistress sylva, you have saved more than just a man today. You have saved a family, saved a whole generation or more of future lives too!!”
Turning in the doorway to bid the couple a farewell, Paechra caught Anna giving her husband a most passionate and loving kiss.
“Plenty more of those are recommended. That and a plate of meat, the red variety would be best. I expect to visit that horrid slaughter pit that Thomas runs tomorrow at the seventh stroke of morn. I want to see you Daniel, happily working on another poor, innocent beast. Then and only then will I consider my task complete,” Paechra added, sternly.
Anna laughed and nodded, giving Daniel another kiss, as passionate as the first, just as Paechra had suggested.
“For now though, I will be leaving you in one another’s company…” Paechra said finally, after a moment of uncomfortable silence.
As Paechra closed the front portal behind her and heard the lock of the house click into place, she turned away from the home of Daniel and Anna only to find Sarah the seamstress waiting patiently for her.
“Thomas is gone,” Sarah said, leaving the general statement hanging in the air.
“And you have stayed, why?” Paechra asked.
“Paechra, I know why Thomas left, and I am guessing you do also. A butcher and a sewing wench are not supposed to be wrapped up in tales of fiction. Our laws state that the use of magic is a horrid crime. A butcher does not think beyond the rules of his life, go to work, you kill the meat. Everyone eats… No magic, a simple life. The animals he deals with don’t beg for mercy and don’t come back to life.”
“And what of the life of a seamstress… Simple too, is it not?” Paechra quizzed.
“Not anymore!” Sarah cried out with a genuine laugh. “Whether it was magic that I witnessed, or a miraculous recovery from near death… perhaps there is something to the tales young ladies speak as the needle work becomes tedious…”
“Tell me the honest truth then, Sarah. Something your old men would be more than pleased to scribble in the books they call history,” Paechra pleaded. “Why aren’t you afraid of that which you do not understand?”
“I have seen you help one of us, without offer of payment…”
“The obvious look of joy on both their faces was more thanks…” Paechra interrupted. The seamstress, used to such interruptions simply nodded stiffly to say she had heard and then ploughed on with her train of thought, stunting whatever it was that Paechra was going to say next.
“So I am offering to help you find your father,” Sarah stated.
Paechra paused, her mouth slowly forming into a soft smile.
“Thank you,” whispered the sylva.
“But first we must return to the forge and tell Gregory and Raven what we plan to do. If we are to search the whole of this city we need a plan. We also need people to find us if we get into trouble…” the seamstress explained thoughtfully.
As Paechra and Sarah made their way along the cobbled back streets of Andrapaal, the sylva begged her friend to elaborate of what troubles they might face. The seamstress though, kept silently tight lipped the whole way back.

***

It was after three o’clock when Vladimir finally arrived at the palace to attend the meeting of the knowledge keepers. Once a week at the third hour of the afternoon the sages of the blue robes met to hear an update of the decisions made by King Fredrickson. Moosuf of the red robes normally paraphrased what had been recorded in the great tomes, enabling Vladimir as Chief Sage to update the other elder sages quickly, sufficiently without the need to bore the old men with the intricate details of who, when, where or why. Moosuf’s report included the names of those involved and the final decision. Today Vladimir was late for the meeting, the time he had wasted arguing with a butcher about slaughtering Paechra’s horse meant that a transaction the sage had thought would take less than half an hour had nearly taken thrice that time.
‘If I had not bothered taking the time to speak with Thomas I would have been finished in minutes and the steed would have been off my hands,’ Vladimir thought, frustrated.
He had thought to use the power of the tome to convince the man to take the horse and keep it, but had rejected such an idea moments after he thought of it. Using magic out in the open in the middle of the day was definitely not wise. Now there would be no steak for dinner, no extra coins in Vladimir’s pocket and the sage had needed to suffer the embarrassment of stabling the horse again. This afternoon’s meeting was the last thing that Vladimir needed right then. The long delay at the butcher also had meant that Vladimir had missed his appointment with the knowledge speaker, Moosuf.
‘I am completely unprepared,’ thought Vladimir as he stepped into the room filled with his brother sages. ‘How did I let this happen?’
“At last you grace us with your presence, Chief Sage Vladimir,” cried one of his fellow knowledge keepers.
“I apologise my brothers!” replied Vladimir courteously. “I needed to see a man about a horse.”
“Planning a trip away, brother?” enquired a voice from the crowd.
“No, he is planning an early retirement!” announced another sage in reply.
“What? Is our chief sage buying up ducks and geese and a horse for a hobby farm and moving somewhere out near Hundred-Rainbow,” added a third voice from the crowd.
“Preposterous!” shouted Vladimir. “I plan neither a holiday, nor retirement… Now I regret to inform you all that I have nothing to report.”
The crowd of elderly sages made sounds of disappointment and annoyance.
“I shall arrange for sage Moosuf to update you all,” continued Vladimir. “Now if there is nothing more I shall grant you all a free afternoon.”
“Actually there is something, Vladimir,” said a voice from the crowd. There was something about the tone of the voice that caused Vladimir to seek out the face of the sage who had spoken. As Vladimir focused so acutely upon the gathering of blue robed men he began to suddenly feel nauseous. It was to Vladimir as if he really were navigating a small boat across the waves of a large and tricky sea. He floated upon an ocean of eager pink wrinkly faces, the focus of the crowd’s attentions loomed in the chief sage’s vision as the dangerous rocks that he would sink from if he were to strike just one with a false word or an unplanned statement. The meeting with the blue robes that he was forced to call brothers was not going well. Vladimir had never considered himself a sailor, not an adventurer of any sort. Of course, he had taken risks and traveled, all in the aid of his ultimate goal. Guiding his vessel of half truths and white lies through this ocean of peers was proving the truth of just how poor a sailor Vladimir would have been. One rock in the ocean of blue and pink was larger and more looming than all the others.
“…And you say that you had no part to play in the Citizen’s Eleven meeting this night? That the scheduled time of said meeting happens to coincide with when we had planned to hear from the raven haired Stormsong boy? Your Wisdom… I mean no offence of course but I think I am not the only one to think that a preposterous thought!” shouted the looming rock of doom. Many other sages shouted their agreement. Vladimir, sweating under the pressure, noted for the briefest of moments that other sages were shouting back, on his side. The longer this argument continued though, the quieter these voices became, and the smaller his vessel seemed… The larger the ocean became… More rocks… He was nearly sunk…
“Jefferson! Enough of this I plead! Our business for the evening must be rescheduled. I come to my brother sages to merely allow such news to be recorded!”
“Humph!” Jefferson snorted. “I have been up far too late a night of recent times. I did look forward to hearing the words of the dark haired boy. With any luck I will not be at slumber…”
Vladimir’s eyes went wide. After his horrid morning with the vorsurk in his room, the truth keeper was the farthest thing from his thoughts.
“I have other news, most important that I gathered you all to hear. Our kingdom’s queen is with child! At the earliest of stages I can only guess that it is a male child. The next prince, proof that our royal couple were indeed a perfect match.”
The change of mood in the Great Hall was instantaneous. Vladimir smiled. He sighed, relieved. After a slight change of tack, the vessel of white lies and half-truths was safe in the harbour for the moment at least. The thought of the truth keeper though, caused Vladimir’s smile to fade slowly into nothing. What to do with the youthful pawn was still in debate. Thoughts of Raven led Vladimir to Paechra. Knowledge of her spell casting crimes caused the smile to resurface. If the old men turned nasty once more, their chief sage knew that the chaos caused when he announced the sinister truth about the sylva girl would be most distracting.

***

Back at Gregory’s forge Raven looked up as the face of Paechra, exhausted, peered into the passageway where he sat.
“Good afternoon,” Raven said, his friendly smile turning to a look of concern for the sylva. “You look like you need a long rest.”
“It has already been a long day, but a successful one,” Paechra replied.
“My day too has been a success of sorts,” said Raven. “I went out early, to see my father. Last night I did meet with some brothers of the blade and they did tell me where he could be found. I feel my presence here, returned to my city has brought him grief from memories of what were and what could have been.”
“It gladdens my heart to hear that your father’s new home has been found,” stated Paechra sincerely. Raven nodded thanks.
“I left early, before you awoke, so that I could speak with my father alone. I have learnt a lot this morning and I am forming a plan to regain for my father all that I believe he deserves,” explained the truth keeper.
“And that plan involves two dice and a small pile of stones?” Paechra asked, her keen eyes noticing the pair of bone dice and the pebbles that Raven had in his possession.
“I have been told by a strange pair of messengers that I have luck and the wonder of truth on my side. I am almost certain that this pile will not stay simple rocks for long,” Raven stated with a boyish grin.
Paechra gave Raven a look at the mention of messengers, but said nothing about the spirits as Gregory was nearby.
“Well I spent the day with Daniel, the butcher’s apprentice. I had Thomas buying plants and his woman, Anna was quite pleased with my handy work,” Paechra announced, instead.
“That is great news. I did not know that Thomas was wedded. I began wondering about Sarah, but they seemed more friends to me,” said Raven.
“Anna and Daniel are the couple, silly,” Paechra laughed.
“Oh… Perhaps Thomas and Sarah is a couple too then?” Raven suggested.
“Have more caution concerning your comments about our friends. Thomas, Gregory and Sarah are all quite close companions, something about the eleven citizens of the city,” Paechra replied. Her eyes sparkled with excitement as she continued. “What is more, the seamstress is just outside speaking to our host. She has promised to help me find my father.”
“Shall I join you in the hunt?” asked Raven.
“No, my friend,” replied the sylva. “Sarah suggests we need you here to search for us if we are lost.”
“My father suggested he lives in a city beneath. I doubt that the arena will hold any passages that lead to your father,” said Raven. “I wish the pair of you more luck than we had in looking for the man.”
“My thanks, Raven,” replied Paechra, spinning on the spot and then walking away. The sylva vanished from Raven’s sight, leaving her friend to continue his dicing.
‘If you are real, lady luck then please be with my friends in their searching,’ thought Raven, almost praying. Then picking up the pair of dice again the truth keeper had another practice throw. As he watched the pair of dice spin and bounce the raven haired boy wondered to himself whether a goddess could be in two places at once.

***

Sarah took Paechra back down the street within the slums district where she had first had visions of her father. The search there proved as fruitless again as it had been for Paechra and Raven. Raven’s comments about the arena caused the pair of girls to search near there next. There was no vision of Therdous Lightheart and no hint of a city beneath there either. It was getting near the sixth hour, dusk when the search began new near the market sector. Sarah called for a pause in the search, needing rest. Paechra refused at first, moving towards an open doorway of a smart looking home two streets back from the market’s edge planning to seek out people to ask for even a clue to how the tunnels beneath the city could be accessed. The smell of fine cheese and day old bread hit the nose and stomach of the sylva the moment that Sarah began to unwrap them. Paechra had no choice but to admit to her friend that she was hungry.
“Eat! Eat!” Sarah encouraged as Paechra’s delicate sylva fingers hovered over the food.
“I do need my strength, truly,” Paechra agreed and began to take dainty bites of the cheese. The taste was so delicious though that the sylva could resist no longer. She began to take larger and larger bites, until finally she coughed as she choked upon one tough piece of bread.
“Easy now, it looks like you’d never eaten,” the seamstress laughed.
“Well, in truth, indeed today I had not,” Paechra replied with a laugh of her own.
“But over my many, many years I must admit to sampling at least a little bread and cheese,” the sylva continued as a smile twinkled in her eyes.
“Well then missy!” Sarah cried. “Now that our belly is fuller and our humours improved, perhaps we can get back to our search.”
Paechra nodded in agreement. With the pangs of hunger and the frustrations of failure no longer distracting her, it dawned upon the sylva that she had seen this part of the city before.
“Hold, Sarah! Let me explore this place further before we leave it,” Paechra begged, closing her eyes as she rose from the simple meal.
Silently, Sarah merely watched on as Patchra moved about the cobbled street in her self made blindness.
Paechra stopped. Sarah ran up quickly to aid her but the sylva held up a hand, causing the seamstress to pause. An image had flashed into Paechra’s mind. Her father sat in the dark upon cold stone. The evil circle of crimson still surrounded him. The elder sylva looked tired and ill.
“Obviously you ignore my council child and within the city you remain,” the old sylva sighed. “Seek me out child! Search the city beneath! The tunnel you seek is not far away.”. To Paechra her father’s voice sounded like that of a stranger.
The sylva girl sobbed, a cry of pain and uncertainty.
“Did you hear him Paechra? Did you see your father?” Sarah stammered. Without awaiting a reply the seamstress grasped the sylva in a motherly hug and awaited the flow of tears.
“The city beneath… He said… Find me… City beneath… Oh Sarah… Not far… Thank you… We are close,” Paechra mumbled as she wet Sarah’s chest with her flowing tears.
“Life sets us many a task…” Sarah began as she hugged the sylva even tighter.
“Little do you know, I be your elder by at least fifty years,” Paechra mumbled, pushing herself out of the embrace.
“And little do you know but, I once played as a child in a place very much like a city beneath. I tell you it may be a long shot at the exact place, but in the name of the truth we may not be asking questions much longer. Wipe clean that face of yours, Paechra. It may just be that we find your father sooner than you think,” Sarah laughed, and taking Paechra by the hand she led the sylva on through the streets of Andrapaal.

Raven entered the gambling hall, the old slaughter house located where the slums and the market district met. He was quite in awe at just how full the place still was as he entered alone, equipped with a handful more of Gregory’s silver coins. The blacksmith had said just how obsessed the city was with winning. It was still a shock for the truth keeper to see what looked like a miniature city, with as much chaos, unveil before his very eyes.
“Brother, your weapon must be left at the door…” a gruff voice requested. A fellow truth keeper waited behind a grand table littered with weapons. Merchant daggers and various cudgels joined a handful of long swords. Raven nodded and gave up his blade before he trusted the strange spirits who had visited him and put his faith in lady luck. Just from scouring the boundaries of the humongous room, Raven also noted that some of his brothers stood guard to keep what ever of the kingdom’s peace was left. Handing over his sheathed blade, the truth keeper jingled the few coins that filled his pocket, and strolled through the crowded room until he found a space upon a small betting table. He had few coins, and Raven hoped that the goddess of possibility was not about to help him to lose them all.

***

“Paechra!” the seamstress shouted.
“I am here,” the sylva panted, close by. The nearness of the exotic girl, and the silence in which she traveled and searched, made Sarah jump in surprise as she heard Paechra reply.
“I am sorry…”
“Never mind that, Sarah! You called to me, what have you found?” Paechra stated with urgency. The sylva felt that they were close, so close to finding the tunnel they sought.
The seamstress gave her sylva companion a meaningful look, one full of understanding. Paechra caught the look, and even in the light of the evening, Sarah could see the sylva’s cheeks flush crimson with embarrassment.
Paechra asked the question again, this time, with more patience. The urgent need for news that was good still reflected in the girl’s eyes, but Sarah noted with relief that this time she saw something more. Sarah knew that her friend would stop and listen.
“I believe I have found the place where we as children would disappear from our parents’ eyes. It seems smaller than I remember, but then, I can admit that my life has made me much bigger than I once was.”
Paechra laughed, imagining the seamstress as a little girl and then seeing her as she was now. There had been quite a transformation. The tightness that had unnaturally affected the sylva seemed to vanish in an instant. She moved quickly, but gracefully, like a silent bird of prey. Sarah pointed to the child sized hole in the cobbles that was half hidden in the shadows.
“Find a torch, Sarah. We may not be far from my father. I must find some things myself. We meet back here on the stroke of the hour,” Paechra decided.
‘The seventh hour… The meeting of the eleven…’ Sarah thought to herself with great worry.
“Of course Paechra, on the stroke of the seventh hour. We shall find your father then,” Sarah mumbled.

***

Raven could not believe his luck. The sack at his side easily had enough coin to repay the blacksmith and to pave his father’s path back to riches. The truth keeper had an accident to thank, a table bump by an excited watcher caused one die to fall poorly for a young merchant. The city official had missed the bump and refused to listen to the young gambler’s pleas. Then as Raven cast his own lot, a die that seemed to be destined for disaster clipped a goblet of wine and fell perfectly as Raven wished it. Raven took note of the young merchant, his red hair and broad muscles, the daggers that flashed into his eyes of oak leaf green. Raven knew that then was the moment to leave.
“I demand a chance to dice for what you stole!!” the merchant shouted.
“Alas, I am unable…” Raven begged. Both players turned their attention to the city official.
“I demand!!” the merchant stated again.
“I have a meeting with the sages at the seventh hour…” Raven murmured. He spoke for the benefit of the merchant’s ears even though his eyes remained locked with the city official.
“Then truth keeper, take what winnings are yours, knowing in truth that you are the rightful owner. Our kingdom’s sages are not ones to be kept waiting.
With that said Raven bowed to the official, bowed to the merchant and then accepted an offered sack. The truth keeper did not truly feel safe until the blade marked with the raven was back in his possession, and he was half way up the palace steps.

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• About
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Tim Law

JUNE 2021 AUTHOR OF THE MONTH at Spillwords.com

Timothy Law is a writer of fantasy, horror, detective fiction, general fiction and everything else that pops into his head. He heralds from a little town in Southern Australia called Murray Bridge. A happily married father of three, family is very important to him. Currently working at the Murray Bridge Library in the role of Library Manager he has dreamed since his early high school years of becoming a full-time author. Working for a library, surrounded by so many wonderful stories it is difficult not to be inspired to write. Many of his short stories and general musings can be found on The World of Myth magazine website, his blog - There Are Some Who Call Me... Tim! or on the Parenting Express website. Tim is also the author of the fantasy novel The Eleventh Tome, book one of The Prophecies of Andrapaal. He has a multitude of other novel ideas floating around in his mind. All he now needs is what every author wishes for, time, a little peace and quiet and of course a willing and understanding publisher. While seeking what seems to be the impossible he somehow finds time for scotch and board games with his brother-in-law, family movie nights and weekends away with his wonderful wife.

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