Chapter 24 #2
He pressed forwards.
The temple loomed before him, a monolith of brute faith. Its heavy doors, a final gate. He reached for the handle when—
Footsteps.
A slow, measured tread beyond the door. His heart tightened.
The latch rattled.
The druid rushed into the cold recess of an alcove, his thin form tucked into its narrow depth as night shrouded him.
A priest stepped out.
For a moment, he was certain the man would turn, that his eyes would lift and find the outline of a figure pressed to the stone.
The priest lingered, adjusting his sleeves, muttering under his breath.
The lantern in his grip burned steadily, and with a turn, would have revealed the druid just out of reach.
Finally, the priest made his way across the bridge.
The druid waited, chest rising and falling as the priest’s footsteps faded away. The door had not yet latched. He slipped from his hiding place, fingers catching the edge. A moment more and he was inside, his footfalls lost in the hush.
The air was thick within, disturbed only by the faintest echo of his breath. Tip tap. A figure paced along the nave, candle in hand.
The druid flattened against the curve of a pillar. He did not move. Did not breathe. The man passed in quiet vigil, save the rustle of robes, and the soft scrape of leather soles. Only when the last of his light had faded did the druid creep away.
His eyes darted over the lintels, reading the names carved above. Archways leading to the refectory and the upper dormitories. And… the bookhold.
The druid stopped before a stair. It was narrow, hewn from the same cold stone; its steps worn smooth by centuries of passage.
The must congealed as he descended, as if the earth itself pressed in—warm, damp and tinged with mildew.
At the foot of the stair, a door loomed.
His fingers found the handle, pausing only to listen. No voices. No movement beyond.
The hinges creaked softly as the door yielded, spilling him into the still. He was greeted by the scent of wax and vellum. The chamber was meager, crowded with misshapen shelves stacked with tomes and scrolls. A low, vaulted ceiling arched above, with ribs of dark wood.
Books piled everywhere, their contents thick with age, their bindings stiff with dust. A table occupied the center, its surface cluttered with loose parchment and an old lantern hung from a hook above.
A single window carved into the stone foundations let in the night air, and he watched for shadows in the cloister above. None came.
He had made it. But time was thin.
He sifted through the papers on the desk. Mostly letters and correspondence from within the cleirigh, some from as far as Tírth. All of them emblazoned with a strangely familiar symbol—a braid of endless fire.
He took the lantern from its hook, holding it high as he scoured the shelves.
There were tomes inscribed with hagiographies and the divine writ of kings.
There were scrolls on herbology, horticulture and husbandry.
Psalms and sermons from years past, and calendars dating back to the passage of AEon’Righ.
He had never seen the western annals with his own eyes. The first of the scripture read:
So it is recorded on the fifth day of Lorchanach, when the earth was still young; there came upon the sky sea a terror clothed in fire.
It came not as man nor beast, nor bird nor storm, but something of all these things, and yet of none.
It moved above the world with great and terrible majesty and stretched wider than the vale, dark as the starless midnight.
And upon its back it bore the light of all creation.
A sun not risen from the west—but carried.
It set the sky alight as it passed, and the rivers filled with fire.
It gave no cry, no bellow, nor call of war—only silence in the vastness of its wake, save for the wind that chased behind it, hot and howling. And when it was gone, the sun no longer slumbered below the horizon, nor hid in the gloom of dawn—it rose and set and the days became long.
Crús Crúnach, from the Scroll of the Dawn-Witness
The further he dug, the dustier the pages became, till his gaze caught upon a familiar rune. The ink was faded, yet he could make out the branches of the Oron’Feyr—symbol of the first men.
His breath snagged.
These were druidic texts.
But why were they here at Rhyd-hal? How did the An’Atherin get their hands on them?
The druid set the lantern aside. The books—if they could be called thus—were small and ragged, like they might turn to ash if held too tightly. The pages were tattered and threadbare.
He was careful, pulling back the binding to reveal an ancient scrawl, barely legible beneath centuries of wear.
It was strange.
Druids weren’t known to keep written records. The knowledge they collected was passed down through story and song. What little they had written remained in the Fáoth under the protection of their elders. To see such things here…
He didn’t know why, but it turned his belly.
Brushing the dust aside, his eyes followed the runes etched faintly beneath. These texts seemed less like scripture and more like journals.
“Second day of Murtagg in the fifteenth year of the Ere of Sun…” he read in a whisper. “The singr speaks of the hatching, and of the woman of root who spoke in tongues of wood.”
The record told of the time after the Awakening, before the Ere of Stone and the rise of the An’Atherin.
Of the people of the wood, who sang and walked in the deep forests and communed with the trees.
He knew those stories from when he was young.
When the fíor would spin tales of the Naém’a—she who had taught his kin to see the past.
His brows knit.
These were not the tales he had heard as a boy, but a methodical account of secondhand experiences; a detailed observation, as if the author had been performing some sort of… inquiry.
Though, he could hardly believe any scholar of the An’Atherin might concern themselves with the words of druids.
One passage in particular struck him.
“From the notes of Malthnur, on the Black Tide and the coming of the Muuirn… It began in the dead of Mírach, when the seas turned to iron. The fisherfolk of the western cliffs saw first the shapes upon the tide—vast pale ships. With no horn and no banner, they came. Not men, nor creatures known, but things of ruin—made of ice and skin and the oldest stone. They moved without word, without want, save for one thing alone: the flesh of men. But they found the world empty of offering.”
As he read, the druid’s mind danced in dreams. The scene from the lake was again within his head; the apparitions moving, just as monstrous as he recalled them, but clearer now. They were giants, great and fearsome, with hulking bodies built for destruction.
“Then, the great beasts turned their heads to the sky, and one by one, waded back into the dark, carried off by the tide that had borne them.”
And just like that, they were gone. The creatures… the vision… the room was still.
They had come before.
His mind worked, grinding the truths down, yet they became no more digestible. Had he seen the future? Or had he simply remembered something all memory had forgotten?
But the image of the Vaich stood bloody on the field would not subside.
If they had come before… could they come again? If it was a warning, then a world awaited without moon. Without sun. And only he now knew of its coming.
But what could he do? Aside from that record, he had no proof but his own spoken word, and he could hardly believe himself. His only ally, Hirí, was leagues away at the Augeri, and the Oracle had yet to wake.
He did not even know if such creatures could be defeated.
How had it happened before?
No matter how many times he read the passage, it became no more clear. “Empty of offering…?”
A noise stirred his blood and the druid’s head shot up. Footsteps on the stair. His heart pounded. He tore the page from the tome, folding it as gingerly as he could manage.
The footsteps grew heavier.
He blew out the lantern light and searched the room for a place to hide. But this time, there were no corners deep enough to stow him.
A sound—the fluttering of wings and the scratch of stone. He glanced to the window, his eyes catching the familiar silk feathers upon the ledge.
“Ainfír?” he gasped. The raven looked at him, tilting its head. The druid rushed over. Standing on his tiptoes, he pushed the parchment through the small opening. “Ainfír, keep this safe. I must go, but I promise you ten crusts if you’ll help me.”
The raven chittered, and the druid hushed him as the door swung wide. He darted behind a shelf as the footsteps echoed louder. The gold of a fresh lantern dripped inside. There came a hoarse, gruff clearing of the throat. The druid recognized the voice at once.
Othrik.
He pressed against a shelf, as if he could contort himself smaller. His breath grew in the tightness of his chest, but he dared not release it.
There came the rustling of papers and the clink of the iron lantern upon its hook.
The druid was still.
“Be gone, vermin!” He tensed as the old priest swept into view, shooing the raven on the sill. “You are ill omen!”
The creature cawed at him loudly, ruffled at the man’s animated waving. Then it reached down, snapping up the folded parchment with its beak and hurried off.
“Damned thing…” Irritably, the priest turned, his rabid eyes falling squarely upon the druid.
His blood ran cold.
“You,” hissed the priest. “By flame… is this some foul vision?”
“Yes,” whispered the druid. “You are terribly delirious. Lay down your head and be fast asleep.”
“Speak not another word, witch!” The man rushed him with surprising speed and gripped him tightly at the elbow. The druid resisted, but the priest overpowered him with brazen rage. “I have you now, and you will be very sorry, indeed.”