The Running Girl (Kaunovalta, Book I) Read online



  The Chronicles of Anuru

  Kaunovalta, Book I

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  THE RUNNING GIRL

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  by D. Alexander Neill

  © Copyright D. Alexander Neill, 2012

  License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy.

  Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author.

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  Table of Contents

  Prologue: The Sacrifice of Miros

  Chapter 1: Starmeadow

  Chapter 2: Running

  Chapter 3: Frideswide

  Chapter 4: The Deeprealm

  Chapter 5: Stonewisdom

  Appendix 1: Songs and Poems

  Appendix 2: Dramatis Personae

  Appendix 3: The Tale of the Making

  Other books by D. Alexander Neill

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  Prologue ♦ The Sacrifice of Miros

  When he had finished with each of his vile creations, Uru sent them into the world, and they gave their service and their loyalty to the Powers of the Dark. The fell beasts of the Dark were disobedient, and Bardan took them under his careful overlordship, fearing that if his siblings – who were ever untrustworthy and jealous of his rule – were to gain so great a following, they might one day challenge him for mastery of the Uruqua. Aided by his seven Servants, Bardan undertook to instruct his new minions in the dread knowledge and wisdom of Uru.

  The earliest to be sent forth to plague the world were the First-Born: the dragons, and the giants. Achamkris, eldest and wisest of Bardan’s Servants, was given lordship over the great wyrms; and the uncertain fealty of the giants was given over to Gargarik, less wise, perhaps, but no less mighty. Achamkris struck a bargain with Gargarik, so that each aided the other; and, as a result, the dragons grew mightily in strength and power, and the giants grew in wisdom and lore.

  Foremost among their achievements was the theft of one of Bræa’s great gifts to the Kindred. Achamkris, in mortal form, espied upon the elvii, and stole from them the secret of speech, and gave it to his children; and with it, the wyrms, long-lived and shrewd beyond mortal ken, were able to plumb the depths of the Art Magic, mastering its innermost secrets long before any among the Kindred.

  Under the tutelage of Achamkris, the Dragons prospered; for they lived long years, and were in time acknowledged the most powerful, wisest, and feared of all the mortal beings upon Anuru. Fell minions of the dark quailed before them, and even some among the Powers feared to contend with the lords and princes of dragon kind. But still they were outdone by the children of Bræa, the Kindred; for the Dragons did not possess the greatest of the gifts that Bræa had vouchsafed her children: the freedom of Choice, to serve whom they wist, Anari or Uruqua, the darkness or the light.

  It was Choice – a choice made by one of the daughters of Bræa – that in the fullness of time changed the world, setting at naught all of her careful plans.

  - from the Tarinas Valtakirjas

  (The Book of the Powers)

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  In the days before days, before the first dawn, when all the earth lay under the stars, Hara – lord of the skies, the woodlands, and magic – walked the valleys and dells, surveying his charge, in mortal guise. In this long-vanished time – before accepting, from the hands of his sister Bræa, dominion and lordship over the elvii – Hara had, as yet, taken only one of the minions of light into his service. He was particular in his vision of the ways of the world, wise Hara was – and adamant in his desire that his adopted children should come into their powers not only with strength, but also with the wisdom to govern that strength. Thus, while the Age of Making lasted, he was served only by Gemmo, the Lady of the Winds, to whom was given dominion over the raptors and predators of the skies. She was a paragon of swiftness and of strength; her sight was long, and none could approach her on the wing, and she wielded a golden sword, from which sprang the fires of the heavens.

  But though he was pleased with her service and her guardianship of the skies, Hara sought out others to bear his will unto the woodlands. For Gemmo loved the winds, and the clouds, and descended therefrom only to visit the eyries of her people, and came not unto the earth, save only in pursuit of prey. And so, Hara sought far and wide for one of the minions of light who might be willing to serve him as a guardian of the woodlands. He found none; and so he cast his net wider. At length he discovered one of the Brahiri, the children of Bræa, newly severed from their divine mother; one of the elvii, a rough warrior who roamed the woodlands with bow and sword, confounding the beasts and minions of the Uruqua, taking especial pleasure in confounding the designs of Bardan.

  This warrior was called Larranel. In his ferocity, his skill at arms, his love of the forests and of his people, Hara found a spirit meet unto his needs; and he approached the warrior, and elevated him as his second servant. And right well did Larranel serve his new master, haunting wood and wold like death avenging; until, in the fullness of time, he had earned another name among his former kinsmen: Defensor Sylvanus, that is ‘Protector of the Woodlands’. And in latter days, Larranel the Protector was much beloved and revered of the greenland-dwellers among the Haradi, and was hailed as the greatest of Hara’s servants.

  But still Hara besought him still for a third servant; for his sister Bræa had vouchsafed him a third duty, making him the patron of those among the Kindred who counted themselves practitioners of the Art Magic. This was a difficult task to answer, for the Brahiri were yet new to the arcane art, even those who would later become Hara’s children, the Haradi; and many long years would pass before they mastered the flux, and the great mage-kings Tior, and Xiardath, and Biardath would come to plumb its uttermost depths. And so Hara searched long, and in vain.

  These years, the waning years of the Second Age, the Age of Making, were a fell time for the Brahiri. For they had been rejected by their mother Bræa, who, fearing their free and wilful natures, had lifted up her hand to unmake them; and though they had been spared this doom by the intervention of Ana, and Bræa had repented of her rash decision, and given up the light that was in her, the care of the Brahiri had not yet been given into the hands of the brothers of Bræa, who in time would become their new teachers and guardians. Thus the kindred found themselves bereft of guidance ,and at the mercy of the evil powers, and in darkness; for the light of Bræa was gone from them, and the Lantern had not yet been forged by Ana, and placed in the sky to brighten the world for them. They lived without the protection of their mother, who had hitherto kept them safe from all harm, and were besieged upon all sides.

  It was then, after her betrayal and fall, that Bardan attempted to undo the various creations of Bræa. To this end, he sent his monsters against the kingdoms of the Brahiri, all of which were scattered, and disorganized, and despondent in their abandonment. And though the monsters were few in number, they were mighty in stature and in strength. The great vermin spread across the lands of the Brahiri, bringing pestilence and laying waste to crop and furrow. Bats and vultures rained from the skies, wolves ranged far and wide, and the Giants bestrode the land like titans, wreaking untold destruction.

  Most fearsome, however, were the great wyrms of Achamkris, Lord of Dragons, who in addition to their matchless strength and invulnerability, had learned well the secrets of the Art Magic that Achamkris h
ad stolen from the elvii. Thus while the Brahiri had the strength to withstand even the greatest of the attacks by the other monsters, the wyrms breached their defences time and again; and Bræa’s children stood, in their final extremity, upon the very precipice of ruin.

  Into this dark and uncertain world, Miros was born – a princess of the elvii, daughter of one of the lesser kings of a lesser kingdom. The youngest of five children and the only daughter, she was a child of grace and beauty, who had forsaken her family’s martial tradition, taking up the staff instead of the sword. It was a hard road she chose, for there were then few magi and books, and no masters or colleges; thus, she learned her art from the winds and skies, and the trees of the forests, and the dark bones of the earth. And though she discovered much in this wise, and grew powerful, as potent a mage as ever her people had known, the deepest secrets of the Art Magic escaped her. For even the mightiest of students, in order to prosper, advance, and triumph, requires a mighty teacher.

  Her father was a fell warrior, but he was no mage. For long and long had he held his mountain realm against the onslaught of the minions of Bardan; but mortal flesh was no match for the might of the Powers of Dark, and at length, after too many bloody victories, his warriors had been slaughtered, his bastions had crumbled, and his kingdom lay in flames. One of Miros’ earliest memories was of her father wielding his mighty sword left-handed; for one of the great wyrms had taken the right. Yet even maimed, he remained a terror to his foes, slaying all who assailed him, or who threatened his precious daughter. And when Miros marvelled at his strength, and wept for his sacrifice, he told her, in gentle tones and low, that the true warrior of the light does not fear pain, or shun it; but rather embraces pain, and turns it into power.

  It was a lesson that she never forgot.

  When at last her father was slain whilst defending the gates of his city from the hosts of darkness, Miros – her heart breaking with the pain of bereavement – remembered the lesson of the right hand. She clung to her father’s words, so well-remembered, and took them into the shadows of her heart, and there they grew. In that, her darkest hour, she conceived a plan. Cloaked in the raiment of fallen foes, she left her father’s city, travelling deep into the mountain vales claimed by Bardan’s monsters. Posing as an itinerant conjurer, she sought out the greatest of the wyrm-magi of Achamkris, winning her way past sentries, and even whole armies, by the power of her magic, her sheer audacity, and the force of the spirit that burned within her.

  At length, after learning much, and surviving many narrow escapes, Miros came upon the fastness of Sciarratekkan. Most ancient; once the mightiest of dragons, now an aged and wily serpent, the Captain-General of the incarnadine wyrms had at one time stood first among all of the councillors of Achamkris. But no longer; his strength was failing, and his end was near, delayed only by dint of his incomparable magicks, and by the sheer force of the blazing desire within his breast.

  The princess of elves cast her life into the crucible in the hope that she had rightly guessed just what the great wyrm’s greatest desire might be.

  Using all of the skill and wit at her command, Miros penetrated his lair, evading or defeating all of his slaves and guardians in turn, and at last confronted him, seeking to wrest the deepest secrets of his power from him. But unknown to her, her subtleties were of no avail, for Sciarratekkan had lived long, far longer than she; far longer, in fact, than any others of his kind. His power and mastery vastly outstripped her own. In the instant that she met his eye she was unmasked, helpless and mind-bared before the great red wyrm.

  As was and is the way of his kind, Sciarratekkan toyed with the elf-maiden, hoping to see how much of herself she was prepared to sell in order to buy her freedom and her life, seeking to debase her and plunge her into despair before consuming her utterly. But Miros surprised him. Rather than pleading or weeping, she stood tall and proud before her fell foe, and offered her flesh to her captor.

  It is mine already, to do with as I wish, Sciarratekkan hissed, scorching the air with his sulphurous exhalations, the deadly lash of the wyrm-speech ringing in her mind like the tones of an adamant bell.

  “Your pardon, incarnadine one, but you misunderstand,” the maiden replied, struggling to keep her voice bright and unwavering despite the swift shiver of fear that clawed at her soul. “I do not offer myself as meat, but as mate.”

  Pardon yourself, insignificant one, the dragon answered, vile mockery dripping from every word, his vast jaw working in a terrifying grin. But I fear you would find my bulk…uncomfortable.

  “Surely a mage of your power could rectify the disparity,” she replied archly.

  Indeed. Sciarratekkan hissed an incantation in the sibilant tongue of his people, and his figure warped and blurred. An instant later, the great wyrm had vanished, and in its place stood an elf-lord – tall and well-made, of surpassing beauty, like unto that of Miros’ folk. But he had scarlet hair such as no elf had, that writhed and smoked in the hot, vaporous atmosphere of the great wyrm’s weyr; and his eyes whirled and glowed a deep, deadly crimson, like pools of viscid fire.

  Miros stood motionless as this fiendish vision of one of her kin-folk approached. She felt a line of fire along her jaw as Sciarratekkan stretched out his hand and caressed her cheek. “That is not what I had envisioned,” she said. Then, with swift words, she repeated his incantation; and in a heartbeat, the elf-maiden was gone. In her place crouched an enormous incarnadine wyrm, blood-red and deadly, sleek, and surpassingly lovely…at least in the eyes of a dragon.

  Sciarratekkan reversed his transformation, and a moment later the great wyrms stood together, necks entwining. Is this why you came to me? the elder wyrm asked, eloquent and commanding, at home in the unspoken dialogue of his natural idiom.

  In part, Miros replied in the same language. I will speak plainly, for it is said that no lies can be told in the tongue of dragons. I seek only the power and skill to protect my people from the depredations of your armies. To obtain it I offer you my industry, my obedience and my body, for a span of seven years.

  That is but the breath of a whisper in the life of dragons, Sciarratekkan replied, nettled by her candour, and yet intrigued by her offer. And – it must be said – aroused, by her beauty and her power. He had been centuries without a mate.

  As it is in the lives of Elves, Miros answered tartly. But for you, it is a guarantee of immortality.

  Again, I beg your pardon, dread master, but I must speak plainly. You are old; and though your power is yet great, unmatched among your folk, your hide is dark, your teeth are dull, and the beat of your wings no longer shakes the earth. Your mate departed an age and more ago, and never have you taken another.

  You have no heir. I offer you the chance for your legacy to live on…through our child.

  Sciarratekkan snorted derisively. A bastard offspring; half a dragon, half an elf. What manner of legacy is that?

  A legacy of power, Miros replied. You are unsurpassed in might, and all-knowing in the ways of the dark. I am well-versed in the lore of my people and the power of the light. Our child would bestride both worlds, a magus unrivalled in all the history of Anuru.

  The ancient wyrm was entranced by the maiden’s offer, but still cautious. My master, he said slowly, would not view my betrayal of his arcane secrets with favour.

  What matters that, Miros asked bluntly, if you are near death in any case, and your posterity has been assured, and your line hidden from him? She held her breath as the elder dragon debated with himself.

  At long last, he nodded. It is well, he said. I accept your bargain, child of Bræa. You will be my love, and learn my art. Our paths will be joined forever, and you will raise our child to follow it. And his footsteps will shake the foundations of the earth.

  Thus was the bargain struck. elf joined with Dragon, breaching the unbreachable gulf separating the darkness from light, and spanning the void that had separated the children of Br
æa from the monsters of Bardan since the Making. Miros opened herself to the scorching embrace of her foe, and became one with him. The two bloodlines, mingled by magic, grew strong together – mighty in wisdom, rife with arcane power, and as invincible as adamant. The inviolable boundaries set in place in ages long past were shattered, and the shadow of that shattering would in time prove long and grievous upon the earth.

  The lovers did not care; each was surfeited by the fruits of their bargain. Sciarratekkan was besotted with his new mate, for Miros was not only beautiful; she was skilled, and talented, and knowledgeable. And she was curious; she learned quickly the ways of dragons, and though the lessons often were difficult, even harsh, she endured them. Indeed, she soon came to long for her weyr-mate’s embrace; for, in the union of their bodies, his spirit relaxed its iron vigilance, and their minds were as one. In their shared passion, she gleaned much from his unguarded spirit that might otherwise have been closed to her.

  As she slowly came to comprehend the vast, incomparable arcane mastery of the great wyrms, Miros – to her consternation and dread – kindled. As she worked, and studied, and learned, her mate’s child quickened in her womb. Oft she lay awake at night, apprehensive, feeling the fell creature growing inside her, gritting her teeth to smother the pain as her diminutive form stretched beyond all nature to accommodate the creature taking shape within it. She knew well what she bore: a twisted, unnatural child; an abomination that had no place in the plans of Bræa or of Bardan, and no claim on life or sustenance anywhere in heaven or upon the earth.

  The pain of the quickening was nigh unbearable, but she determined to bear it. Each day, she swore that she would last another, and thus earn another day’s wisdom from her ancient tutor, and so purchase another day’s survival for her people. To ease the pain, she spent more and more time in dragon’s form, living as one of the great red wyrms; and she came to understand their lust for wealth, and power, and glory, and the skies, and began to comprehend their indifference to mortal aspirations and endeavours, and their contempt for the petty, weak, ephemeral beings that crawled like insects in the dust beneath their wings.

  All these things wyrm-form granted her; and as she became one with the wyrm, the memory of her old shape faded and grew dim. She had learned well the lesson of the right hand; she had embraced her pain, and it became her power. And that power grew daily.

  At length, the seven-year span ended, and it seemed to Miros that the time had come and gone in a fleeting instant, like the beat of a moth’s wing. Sciarratekkan was despondent, saddened that his bargain with Miros had come to an end. To his surprise, he had grown genuinely fond of the lovely elf-maiden, for she had proven to be more than a careful and ingenious student; she was also a courteous and gentle companion, a staunch weyr-mate, and a dutiful and dedicated consort. And she was mighty; he realized at last that, under his able tutelage, her power had grown to match his, and he was both please, and astonished.

  And, too, she was the mother of his heir. The great wyrm felt a great affection for the child of mingled blood that was growing rapidly within her womb – affection, and pride. He found that he was looking forward, with great anticipation, to meeting his child, and learning its name, and teaching it to fly, to hunt, and – most important of all – to grip the flux in its talons, and bend it to its will.

  Thus when Miros arose one morning, taking – for the first time in more than a year – the shape of her mother’s people, the great wyrm’s spirit quailed within him. For he knew that the period of her commitment, the end of the their bargain was at long last come.

  Sciarratekkan eyed the tiny elf-woman’s rippling, distended abdomen with dismay, and plunged into despair at the thought that he would not see his child born, nor watch it prosper and grow. He pleaded with her to stay at his side. Will you not remain with me, he implored, that we might raise our child jointly, and see it grow strong, and set upon the path to power, and together instruct it in the arcane arts?

  Miros smiled gently. Dread lord, said she, I have no intention of ever leaving this, our home.

  Sciarratekkan was relieved, even delighted, but at the same time puzzled. Have you then forsaken your people, and your promise to deliver to them the fruits of your bargain?

  I have forsaken no one, Miros replied firmly. I intend indeed to gift them with the hard-won fruits of my labours. But only in part.

  Reaching into her robes, she held up a scroll of magnificent white parchment, bound with a golden cord. I have done so every day. All of your wisdom now resides with them. This… testament contains the last of the knowledge, art and mastery that I have learned from you. It is my legacy to my people, for it will give them the power to resist you and all your foul brood; and, if you persist against them, to destroy you.

  Also, she added in a forlorn voice, it explains why I have done what I have done; and why I now do what I must. Closing her eyes, she whispered a brief incantation, and the scroll vanished. An instant later, its place in her hand was taken by a gleaming silver dagger.

  The great wyrm frowned. What have you done, my love? he asked, still not comprehending the import of her words.

  As I promised, I have shared with my people one of the fruits of our union, the elf-maiden replied firmly, yet with a grim set to her jaw. All of your knowledge is now in their hands, to be used to confound your master, and his master, and all the Powers of Dark.

  But wherefore yon blade? the dragon asked, nonplussed. What possible reason…

  It is a remedy, Miros interjected harshly, for the other outcome of our liaison.

  Perhaps one day, the children of Bræa will join with the great wyrms, and will spawn a long line of powerful magi. But if we do, it will be on our terms, not yours.

  I, for one, will never be party to such an abomination. And so saying, she reversed the dagger, and to Sciarratekkan’s horror, plunged it deep into her swollen belly.

  The dark child shrieked in agony within her womb as the dagger pierced her tender flesh, burying itself within the wyrmling’s unborn body. Miros ground her teeth against the pain and collapsed to the flame-scarred and smoke-stained floor of the cavern. The wyrm-spawn clawed frantically at her womb, struggling for life; and first one razor-taloned foot, then another, and finally a claw tore through her tender flesh, emerging into the dank air of the great wyrm’s lair, staining the stones with gouts and spatters of its mother’s blood.

  With the grim determination of the doomed, Miros grasped the squawking, struggling, mortally wounded dragonet, and tore its writhing body from the ragged wound in her midriff. Smiling coldly into her mate’s horrified eyes, she calmly twisted and broke the tiny creature’s neck…then tossed the pathetic, bloody little corpse at Sciarratekkan’s feet.

  Her eyes fell on the still, silent thing. It had been a female, she realized.

  Something within her broke at the terrible, heart-wrenching sight.

  The great wyrm reared back in surprise, hissing and baring his fangs. Murderer! Betrayer and oath-breaker! he screamed, shattering the rocks, and scattering his terrified minions to the corners of the cavern.

  “This is not murder, but a cleansing,” Miros hissed through pain-gritted teeth, lapsing in her extremity into the speech of her people. “Nor have I broken any oaths. The elves make no bargains with the vermin of Bardan!”

  Liar! The great dragon screeched. Liar and deceiver! You promised me your obedience and your love!

  “I promised you only my flesh, worm,” Miros taunted him. “Take it. I need it no longer.”

  And with that last word – her mission complete, and her life sped – she set the edge of her dagger to her throat, and cut deep.

  As her body slumped to the floor of the cave, Sciarratekkan trumpeted like a mad beast, howling to the skies in rage, agony and despair. The very stones of his lair were riven from their foundations, and a black cloud blotted out the sun. A storm of incandescence incinerated his fallen c
onsort and his murdered child, and mounted in a vast, towering pyre visible for a hundred leagues, that melted the very bedrock of his lair, drowning the ancient wyrm and all of his servants, slaves and minions in a vast, seething ocean of consuming flame.

  Miros closed her eyes against the incarnadine glare, and greeted the cleansing fire with a sigh of relief.

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