Roger Taylor - The Return of the Sword

‘That’s probably just the lad’s way of telling his story. Maybe we’re reading too much into this skill of his,’ Hawklan pressed.

Andawyr’s reply was firm. ‘No. If you recall, I journeyed through the Pass of Elewart with Sumeral’s presence all around me – journeyed in some terror, I might add. And with you into Narsindal. I’m well attuned to Him.’ He indicated Antyr. ‘I could feel His presence when you told us about the blind man, and it was there in some degree when all the others told their tales. I know it as well as I know the Cadwanen. And it wasn’t there when Thyrn spoke.’ He wrapped his arms about himself and closed his eyes briefly.

Despite this disavowal, Hawklan nevertheless looked set to pursue his objection. Andawyr, however, gave him no opportunity. ‘Everything that Thyrn told us was deeply strange. The very place he described where Vashnar and this figure – this entity – met was unlike anything I’ve even heard of. None of the intricate, elaborate, obsessive patterns, the stark points and edges that typify His work – the frantic scratching after His notion of perfection. And what the figure actually said.’ He leaned forward, drawing the circle of listeners tighter. Only Gulda remained motionless. His manner became intense. ‘Remember, think back. Thyrn’s telling was so vivid, he had us all standing next to him in that strange grey half-world – there and not there – eavesdropping on this exchange. We could feel the figure’s appalling cruelty and bloodlust. And also that it was all too human. When it first appeared it seemed to be a manifestation of many wills, but then it became one distinct individual. Yet when Vashnar asked it who it was, it was puzzled at first, then amused.’

‘“I am remade in my old image by forces that I do not fully comprehend.”’

It was Gulda, reciting the words that Thyrn had put into the mouth of Vashnar’s mysterious companion. Her voice was flat and without emotion but Hawklan noticed that her hands, folded over the top of her stick, were tense, as though she were gripping it to prevent herself from trembling.

‘Yes,’ Andawyr said, slightly unsettled by this unexpected assistance. ‘“For aeons I have been scattered, without form,” it said. “Such an event as we have here – such a coming-together – does not happen once in ten thousand generations.” These aren’t the words of Sumeral or any of His acolytes. Apart from the fact that Sumeral was amongst us less than a single generation ago, He’d never admit to any ignorance, least of all about how He came to be. He perceives Himself to be the true beginning – the very fount – of all things. And His followers always bear His stamp – the mark of the chains by which He binds them – always. It’s unmistakable.’

Hawklan made to speak, but a slight gesture from Gulda kept him silent. Andawyr snapped his fingers, speaking now as much to himself as to the others. ‘“How I came to be thus I do not know.”’ Andawyr was shaking his head as his conclusion became more certain. ‘More ignorance admitted, you see. It’s not Sumeral, definitely. Nor anything of His. Everything that Thyrn recounted cries out with that.’

‘Who was it, then?’ Hawklan asked bluntly.

Andawyr frowned. ‘I’ve no idea,’ he said flatly and with no small sense of anticlimax. ‘That’s to say, I’ve no idea who the individual was – the hooded figure. But…’ He stopped and squeezed his nose, then ran his hands through his disordered hair a few times.

‘Say what you’ve got to say, old man,’ Gulda said.

‘It’s vague, unclear,’ Andawyr protested.

‘Nor likely to become otherwise if you don’t spit it out.’ Gulda flicked her hood back and leaned towards him, her stick beginning to tap the turf impatiently.

Andawyr made a series of opening gestures before actually continuing. ‘There was something else the figure said to Vashnar. Though he seemed to be like we are – only just discovering something – somehow he knew that both he and those he called his enemies had been defeated. He spoke of a – conjunction – of some kind. A coming-together that shouldn’t have happened. He referred to it as his enemy’s treachery but I’ve the feeling it was some kind of simultaneous attack in which everything was destroyed. A mutual killing.’ Andawyr’s voice fell. ‘He said that a brightness moved across the land – and across the oceans. It moved through everything that lived – what an odd phrase. Even odder, it moved, “at scarcely the pace of a walking man”, growing relentlessly, sustaining itself. The Power can be used with infinite delicacy if needs be, but it can’t do that. Everyone fled before it – “Believer and heretic alike”, but none escaped.’ Andawyr raised his arm to his eyes, mimicking Thyrn’s gesture as he had related the tale. ‘“And then there was only a brightness beyond bearing – a reshaping – a remaking.” A brightness beyond bearing.’

Andawyr’s final words were given a power by the very quietness of his manner that made them seem to hang in the night air, ominous and grim. No one said anything. Even the nearby nightbirds fell silent.

Then Hawklan spoke. ‘Assuming that Thyrn’s tale is true -and I’ve no reason to doubt it – what is it about it that so concerns you? Wars enough have been fought in the past. Armies have destroyed themselves before now. Perhaps the brightness is a metaphor for some military disaster.’

Andawyr was disparaging. ‘I doubt it. You felt the character of the man when Thyrn spoke. Ruthless, powerful, fanatical. He spoke of armies and war machines beyond imagining – that could well be exaggeration. But war machines that would “unravel the very essence” of his enemies? It’s a phrase that’s lodged itself in my mind and won’t go away. Nor will that strange, slow-moving brightness.’

Hawklan intruded, ‘But…’

‘Listen!’ Gulda said sharply, silencing him.

Andawyr nodded gratefully. ‘This is very difficult,’ he said. ‘Ideas are corning together – rushing together – that are shaking the very foundations of almost everything I know – or thought I knew.’ He gave a rueful smile. ‘When Ethriss formed the Cadwanol, it was a desperate time. He gathered all manner of learned men and women together from everywhere to search into ways of opposing Sumeral. But even then he told them they must “go beyond”. Insofar as any of them thought about it they presumed it was his way of telling them to pursue every avenue in search of the skills and the knowledge that would bring Sumeral down – something they were determined to do anyway. Later, in safer times, the phrase was handed down, and mouthed a great deal – not least by myself – but I wouldn’t say that any great thought was given to what he really meant. Now, I suspect, its real meaning is becoming apparent.’ He looked around at his audience before continuing, rather self-consciously. ‘As we’ve studied, thought, tested, experimented, through the generations, learning more and more about… everything… we’ve unearthed and explained many great mysteries – particularly so since the war. Some of our discoveries – the true turbulent, flickering nature of the roots of existence – the strange, vast arches of time and distance out there…’ He glanced upwards. ‘Present great challenges to the way we think about and perceive things, but strange though they are – and they really are very strange – there’s a rightness about them that builds on what has gone before, that truly measures the world and its many parts and that draws us forward. But there’ve been other problems, in many ways less profound, that have brought us to a halt like a ship suddenly striking hidden rocks.’ He brought his fist into his palm in emphasis. ‘In the past we’ve always tended to resolve – I should, perhaps, say dismiss – these by saying that, despite our best endeavours, our theories must be flawed, our measurements insufficiently accurate etc – quite often with some validity. Lately, though, this hasn’t been enough. Now we know that our latest theories aren’t that flawed, our most recent measurements aren’t that inaccurate.’ He held out an arm towards the mountains, their hulking presence now only implied by the absence of stars. Then he took a deep breath and concluded in a rush, ‘It appears that the mountains are older than they should be.’ He looked down at his hands. ‘ We are older than we should be. The stars themselves are. Everything is older than it should be. It isn’t possible that the world we know could have come into being in the time that has passed since the Great Searing. ’