Chapter Five - Bannermane

They crested the hill without realising how close they were to the town, the landscape spread out dramatically below them and Bannermane itself was visible a quarter days walk away despite the grey overcast day. Still the sky refused to drop any rain on them but the strange pressure in the air made Joseph sure that at sometime that day the drought would break. Rundell slowly crouched down to sit next to Arn on an outcrop of rock, his knees crackling as he did so. The others dropped their packs and lay down on the hillside. The old trooper fixed Febra with a grey stare.
"It's not too late to go back and hand over the mandate to some other fools missy."
Febra and the rest of the group couldn't believe their ears.
"How can you say that? Look how far we've come! What kind of soldier are you? If you have to keep suggesting things try not to make them so ridiculous."
"Always consider the ridiculous."
"More sage wisdom eh?"
"Not my words missy, heard some yarn spinner repeat them years ago. Them words stuck with me though, forgot the rest of the story. Shame really, I seem to remember enjoying it quite a lot."
Febra was ready to give the old man some more of her mind when a strange lilting note caught her ears. Arn had been fumbling through the pockets of his hunter's garb but now he had found something and was holding it to his mouth, a look of concentration wreathed his features and it seemed that he was unaware that his activity was being studied by everyone else. A second oddly haunting note floated from the tiny instrument that was cradled in his hands. It was remarkably different from the first, broader with haunting, touching sentiment. If Febra hadn't been watching Arn make the noises she would have sworn that they came from completely different instruments. The hunter managed to produce a run of eight enchanting notes each with a unique feel, spelling out an octave not only of pitch but also emotion. He shook his head unhappily and pocketed the diminutive thing, only then realising all eyes were on him.
"What kind of instrument was that Arn?", Joseph asked innocently.
"Tshh... I wish I knew Joe, I've had it since I can remember. My father says it was left to me by my great uncle, shame the old sod didn't leave some instructions with it too! I often pull it out during the lulls in hunting and give it a try."
"How long have you been trying?", asked Speck.
"Ooo.. Let me see. Around twenty years now I suppose. What you heard is the miserable sum of two decades testing."
Rundell rose slowly to his feet and paced off slowly down the hill.
"Not waiting for us then grandad?", called Febra after him. Arn chuckled slightly and made to follow the soldier's lead. He looked over his shoulder at Febra and grinned. "He said he needs the head start."

By dusk they were nearing the broken wall of Bannermane, parts of which stood almost unchanged since the day they were built. It was clear that the town was never meant to be siege proof but merely defensible against attacks, the fortified walls weren't tall enough and had way too many gates. Large sections were no more than rubble mostly due to freebooters stealing the high grade stone work over a period of centuries and the wooden gates must have earned someone a pretty penny at market. The group trudged through a gap and got their first look at the buildings within, though grand by the standards of the Luff they were made for utility purposes and lacked any form of ornamentation. Once the middle wall was visible it was clear that a great deal of the modern buildings were constructed out of it's stones, often utilising the wall itself as a ready-built fourth wall. Just visible beyond the middle wall were sections of far more complete inner ring, the upper half of the keep visible above it, occluded occasionally by the misty figures of sentries. The grey stone work and the low clouds gave the town a grim and broody feeling. Joseph looked at the clouds and suggested the double-time it to the nearest inn as he felt the storm would break in a matter of minutes.
"Read the clouds can you boy?", asked Rundell.
"A sailor needs to know the weather.", said Joseph, repeating his captain's old maxim.
Sure enough, by the time they reached the only hostelry in Bannermane, the thunder rolled and the mountain of water above them began to pelt down.

With no name and only the traditional jug and cup sign outside the inn, the place promised to be as dower as the rest of Bannermane. A few quiet patrons supped beer at the benches and the innkeeper didn't even look up to see who had entered his establishment. Above the bar an enormous axe adorned the wall, probably fabricated as an ornament, thought Arn, the shaft being a full six feet long and the single flared blade looking like it probably weighed the same as Speck. Around the room less extraordinary weapons and armour hung from the walls, many pieces being only partially complete and almost all beyond any form of use.
"Hot ale perhaps?", a voice chimed from one side of the party. A large, busty woman with blooming red cheeks stood waiting with a tray which could have doubled as a Inpurian nomad's battle shield dangling idly in one hand. While all about her the rest of the tavern dull as dishwater, this woman exuded jocularity.
"Hot ale?", questioned Speck.
"O yes, speciality of the house my handsome young man.", she tilted her head in a fashion Speck had never seen before, it suggested all kinds of things and each one happily given to keep a customer satisfied. "Seat yourselves at this fine bench and I'll bring it out to you. If you're not a convert to hot ale by the time you're through then it's on me." They sat where she had directed them and realised that with just three sentences the wench had somehow completely altered the group's mood. They were glad to have arrived.

By the third round of hot ale all of them had a new rosy glow to their cheeks, even the taciturn Rundell appeared to be enjoying himself in a quiet kind of way. Annabella turned out to be the owner of the establishment and despite their protests, let them have the first round of hot ale on the house. The drink, like Annabella, seemed a curative for the mundane and grey nature of Bannermane, bringing new life and heat to tired limbs and minds. The other patrons kept to themselves and seemed to be made up entirely of off-duty guards.
"Praise the Duke for leaving a garrison here!", touted Bella, "Otherwise this meagre establishment would have been shut years ago."
At that moment a middle aged man wearing a filthy sacking tabard enter the inn, he was short but stockily built with remarkably blond and spiky hair, his self-interested look changed to one of annoyance as he spotted the group.
"So you've arrived at last eh? And seem to have wasted no time getting drunk I notice.", he pulled the sack tabard over his head and dumped it by the door. His clothes beneath were well kept and foreign looking. "Now then Karl, these fine people arrived only an hour ago, don't be spoiling their well needed rest." Annabella chastised.
"Karl of Frydbern? Would that be you?", Febra asked keenly.
"Indeed, and a motley lot you look to transport anything precious. Hot ales was it? 'Tish I expected better, I really did." "Now sir,", interceded Joseph in a conciliatory tone, "we arrived late and had planned to seek you out in the early morning. It has been a long foot march here. I hope you will find that your first impression of us does not betoken our true worth. Why not sit and we'll get to know each other better?"
The others of the group were somewhat taken aback at this fluid display of diplomacy, Arn himself had been planning to say just some such thing, he would not have expected to be pipped at the post by simple Joseph. The archaeologist seemed pacified easily and pulled up a stool. He chuckled to himself for a moment.
"I think I'll have one of those hot ales myself Anna. It is pretty nasty weather."

Once he had checked their warrant paper, Karl seemed keen to expound upon his work at Bannermane, stressing the honour of the commission directly from the council to do so. He explained how some of the greatest points of interest were to be found outside the town itself at the locations of the forces command encampments. "I believe that axe", he said pointing to the enormous weapon over the bar, "was found at such a site. It should incidentally be at a university for study but the locals will not part with it."
Arn raised an eyebrow, "Surely no man could wield such a thing, I thought it was a mere ornament."
Karl sighed at the misconceptions of the lay man.
"No man ever wielded it. Bannermane was invaded by a completely different race from across the oceans. Other, less fine examples, are in my possession. But the size is not untypical for an invaders axe. Sketchy accounts from the university archives tell us that Bannermane was the scene of a secondary invasion, the bulk of the invaders fighting from the east. This second front was dealt with relatively swiftly although there seems to be a lot of controversy over how exactly, a lot of the texts on the subject were destroyed or lost around five hundred years ago, we know of them by references made but the fine details of what exactly happened here are unknown. Hence I am here, learning little by little about that time from the traces that still survive."
Karl looked them each over carefully and looked quizzically at them.
"Which of you is the scribe?"
"I am.", answered Speck, his tone telling the man that he had expected that to be self evident. "Good I will meet with you in the morning. The rest of you can stay here or have a look about Bannermane if you like. And tell me young scholar, have you the tools of your trade with you, a quill and ink perhaps?" Speck's red cheeks told him all that he needed to know. "No worry then I shall entrust with the use of some of my own. There are a few notes I'd like you to take along with the book itself."
"Book?", asked Speck. "Yes the artefact is a book, not what you were expecting I'll warrant. A shield or sword or some such would have been your guess eh? Never under estimate the power of ideas and knowledge, learned friend. Once translated I very much hope that this work will be the crowning achievement in historical study for the next hundred years. Who knows, perhaps longer? So whilst not of any specific military or monetary value, a scholarly burden is upon you all to succeed in this mission, not to mention my own historical immortality!" The last seemed to cause him great amusement. He chuckled to himself and took a long draught from his tankard.

The next morning Arn, Joseph and Febra trudged through the streets of Bannermane, which were turning into a dirty quagmire of earth, rain and horse manure, the only section of the town not to suffer this problem was the flagstoned area between the middle wall and the keep. They had thought once around the middle wall would be a short walk but the filth and the rag tag way the buildings had been reconstructed meant that it was becoming longer and far less pleasurable than anticipated. Arn suggested that they duck into the next merchants building so that they could shelter from the incessant drizzle for a short while. When they found one it had a circular wooden sign hanging outside without any inscription or emblem upon it, seeing on other likely candidates around they decided to go in anyway.

Once inside they knew immediately what nature of shop they were in - weapons in various states of repair hanging from every available section of wall space, there were even short swords hanging from the ceiling. At the back of the long but narrow structure an extremely portly man laboured over a sharpening wheel, periodical plying a dagger to the spinning stone wheel and then examining it carefully. After a few moments he seemed happy with his handy work and laid it aside on a workbench along with half a dozen identical knives, only then did he appear to notice his new clientele.
"Good day sirs and to you too little lady. See anything you like here?"
"Much that I like smith, your work seems handsome and...", Arn cast an eye about the place, "abundant too."
The fat smithy roared with laughter, his midriff rolling along with the sound.
"I love to work dear hunter, yes for that is surely what you must be in those woodland clothes and such a fine bow - do you know I tried my hand at bows once but I guess my touch is only for forging things. This 'abundance' is the sad state that the garrison is leaving me in, half of them were transferred out to other duties and the couple that came in were all old campaigners looking to trade weapons in for retirement to the farm or some such. Any road up, what can I interest you in or perhaps you just came in to get out of the rain, eh?"
"We've been rumbled.", noted Febra.
"I think you have our little scheme Master Smith, but I would gladly pay to have my knife sharpened and to look around for, say, until the rain stops."
The smith gyrated in laughter again and then held his hand out to the girl for her blade. A look of ill-concealed disgust crossed his face as he took it to the back of the shop, he gradually slowed as he approached the sharpening stone and then turned about face and marched back up to Febra.
"Exactly where might you have been swindled into buying this item? Hmmm? One of those little pig-iron merchants that sells nothing but kitchen knives and ladles? Look, look here.", he pointed to the centre of the blade and drew his little finger across a slight discoloration that crossed the metal. "It will snap at the first strong twist it gets, no I won't touch such a thing to my fine wheel. But I can't rightly give it back to you now lovey can I? One day your life may depend up it and this thing will let you down and embarrass you at the same time. I have no choice but to make you a replacement."
Joseph protested that they couldn't afford a replacement while Febra tried to shush him, the smithy was already beckoning them over to his wheel.
"There'll be no charge, it is the job of every honest and proud smith to see that things are as they should be, consider this a refund but if you ever see that fowl denter that sold you this again tell him Ian of Bannermane wants a few words with him."
The smith expounded the intricacies of each step of the forging process, carefully examining Febra's hands and judging her strength. The three students stood in rapt attention to him for Ian was not only passionate but eloquent and knowledgeable. Soon the display of his art was over and Ian selected some hard wood and leather to form the blades grip, once again inspecting his client's hand carefully. Febra bounced and flipped the dagger in her hand and without warning threw it the length of the workshop into the upright of the door post. "Incredible.", she said simply. "Your appreciation is reward enough for me. But if I could tender a word of advice: throw only as a last resort, daggers are relatively slow and have low penetration and besides you would now be weaponless. Such fighters as I have known that throw the blades tend to have a set such as the one you see here." His plump hand waved at the six knives on the work top, they were slender and with almost no guard between handle and blade. "If you don't mind me saying so you two look a little green for guard duty and you", he said looking straight at Arn, "might be good in a scrap but carry no armour so I'd guess you weren't long out of some woodland."
Febra proudly explained that they had a charter from the council and would soon be leaving Bannermane to complete the work.
"I see...", grinned Ian, "Some form of delivery for Karl is it? Don't look so shocked, I've been here a long time and there's only two people who get the privilege of council chartered goods and your looking at one."
"The council charters for you?", asked Joseph in disbelief.
"That they do fella me lad. I may live in the murkiest backwater but even the toffs in Pluris know where to order their stuff for special occasions and the like. Ah, the last one was the spring before last, what a priceless blade that was. Shame it'll probably stay in the scabbard until it rusts. A wonder in silver and steel it was, a few touches of jet and gold on the pummel and the guard, nothing like some of those tasteless gem encrusted jobs. Besides every good smith knows that jewels make a weapon impossible to balance." Ian looked at them as if he expected them to confirm what he took as only common sense, instead they were giving him some particularly wide-eyed looks. He reddened a little at what he thought must have appeared to be a lack of modesty on his part and tried to move the conversation onto another topic.
"So, Karl eh? Guess you'll be moving some crumbling old bone, or bits and pieces of one those hefty axes. Here, can I let you lot in on a bit of a running joke?"
They all nodded and came closer to the smith in a conspiratorial huddle.
"The axe above the bar in the inn, it's a fake."
"But Karl, he's a man of lore, he would know wouldn't he?"
"Would he now? Karl let me look through some of the bits and pieces of weapons he's collected from the battle field, wanted to know my thought on some of it. Well I was deeply interested in some of the workmanship and tried my hand at recreating it, took me a while mind you, once it was finished I struck upon the idea of having little Marky claimed he'd pulled it out of one of the peat cuttings and give it to the bar. Karl has never suspected it was a forgery and gets right steamed up about it occasionally." Ian tittered for a moment in a many-chinned fashion.
"I knew no one could have ever really wielded such a thing!", scoffed Arn.
"Lad,", said Ian, fixing the hunter with a gleaming eye, "somebody once did. The only reason Karl is so easily fooled by the little bit of buffoonery is because it's an exact replica."

Speck glanced sidelong at the book resting on a sideboard in Karl's office. He had been taking some extensive dictation from the archaeologist for almost a whole hour now, mostly to people he assumed were nobles or academics, stressing the importance of his work and the need for more funding. Karl noticed his wavering attention and placed his hand gently on the cover of the tome, treating it with all the reverence that a monk might afford a sacred relic. "Intriguing isn't it?", he said at last, "Secrets locked in a cryptic manuscript from an ancient past. It's truly the stuff of legend, not heroic sword wielding legends I grant you but a far more encompassing tale: that of our own origins, the birth of this civilisation and it's people." Speck nodded thoughtfully in response, he didn't take the archaeologists words lightly, almost as exciting as the cracking of a mystery was the mere discovery that mysteries were here, in front of him, for the solving. Karl gently lifted the book, which was as thick as all four of his fingers and moved to the writing desk in front of the scribe. "See how much intrigue there is in the mere outward appearance of this manuscript." Speck nodded and leaned closely in to inspect the work.

"Twin clasps", muttered Speck, "with a locking slide, presumably made of brass, this book was made to travel not sit in a library. The cover is made of tooled leather, I wonder if Arn could identify the hide? The design seems to be geometric but not repeating, have you found any meaning in it?" The archaeologist shook is head in a sorry fashion. "If there is some numerological meaning then I would be a poor analyst, that is part of the reason I am sending it away and not trying to independently study it - as would normally be my right. Some of the finest cryptographers and linguists in Vedian will be called to examine this work, every aspect considered by the appropriate faculty and copies made by the scriveners. What else catches your attention about the book?"

"The page edges have been sectioned by some kind of colour coding, my experience of books is limited but I have never heard of such a thing." Speck noticed Karl nodding with an intently interested look on his face, the boy was glad that he wasn't making a fool of himself at least. "The spine seems the most ordinary part of the book, these few glyphs above the first stitch may suggest a volume number or perhaps a title - it is beyond me to tell which, though if a number I would hazard that it comes from a very large series. Something tells me that these characters are more pictographic than script, could it be an authors signature or mark such as the stone workers use?"

Karl looked astonished at the final comments, "I had always considered it the title, your fresh outlook has given me much to think about." Speck made to undo the latch holding the two clasps but Karl stayed his hand. "There is nothing inside that we can make sense of, and the parchment appears to be of the thinnest rice paper so could be dangerously fragile. I would rather this work was only opened at such a time as the proper minds are available to make sense of it." Speck made a noise of agreement but inside he longed to just see the writing held within, Karl had admitted himself that he only deeply understood his own field perhaps Speck could find some clues that he was unable to penetrate, and if he could then it might help him forge an opening into the Academics. Better to save his investigations until he was sure that he could study undisturbed. Karl packed the book into a sturdy leather satchel and fastened all the buckles with care, examining it to see if there was any way he could further ensure it's safe passage. Finally he sealed the missives that he had dictated to Speck with wax and placed them in a wooden tube which in turn fitted into the side pocket of the satchel. Hooking it over the boys head and shoulder he looked deep into the others eyes, "You darn well stay surrounded by the rest of that motley gang of yours, you'll make a fine scribe but you're no fighter, use your head while they use their sword arms and you'll so the best thing for both them and you. Good luck Speck of the Luff, I want to see you again someday, perhaps we'll get to mull of some of the puzzles from in here." He motioned at the book that was now swaddled in it's travelling clothes. "I truly hope so Karl. We won't let you down." "Look, if your lot aren't keen to get away today then come see me at the dig site south of town. You can't miss it, I've got it all staked out. If you or your friends are interested I'll fill you in on some of the juicy details of what happened here."

They shook hands and wished each other well, Speck promising he would get to the site if he could. The young scribe emerged from the archaeologist office with a feeling akin to a sailor leaving port, his adventure had really begun. The reservations that had dogged him since they had left the Luff were snuffed out, here was the bigger, more fulfilling life that he had been seeking. By the gods, it was like somebody had injected fire into his blood! He set off back to the inn at a lively pace, swinging his arms like a soldier.

Arn grinned at the soldier as he handed over three coppers, normally it would have been real pleasure on his face but now it just seemed a bad habit, after all in a way he had swindled the man out of his money. Still, he mused, the stones were just a game and if a fellow chose to wager without properly judging his adversary what concern was that of his? Some strange spirit of fair play rose up inside him and before he knew it he was buying the man an ale to make up for the loss. He'd never done that before but seeing the good cheer it brought back to the weathered guards face made him forget his qualms and push the man a bit further about detail of the keep.

"It's the only fine bit of stone left for leagues around here, the walls of old Banny may be rotting but from what I hear weren't up to much anyway. Now the keep, there's a different tale altogether. Seen some of the bloodiest fighting in Vedian and truth to tell there ain't a sodding scratch on the thing. Goes down a way too into the ground I mean, some of the lads told me that there's at least two or three levels below. Nice little hoarding spot for supplies n' arra's and what have you."

"So it's all stocked up for siege then is it? I shouldn't have thought the Duke cared that much about Bannermane, you yourself said it was only half-manned and the town get little or no trade."

"Stocked, nah, well I shouldn't think so. None that I know are let down there, standing orders of the garrison, they say that it's got dead water down there."

"Dead water?"

"Aye scurvy stuff likes the sailors sometimes get on the ships, makes you real sick if you get a snoot full. So we just keep to the upper stairs, that's no so bad you see cos' the place was made by them that know how to build and it's mighty good living for a regular like meself. You should have seen the ditch they call the Lough-Taran barracks, we had to pack down there for a few weeks during some o' them high and mighty chin wagging's they had years back. I'd have rather had a barn any day o' the week."

"Can't say the army life ever drew me much, my dad was a in the royal's once so he says. He never pushed me to join up just wanted me to take over as the huntsmaster at the Luff. Guess he didn't think I was suited for it either."

"Ain't much of a profession now-a-days. Even I can remember it being better in the force, council's too tight with the purse strings to keep it up you see. Robbers and thieves on the road are thicker than a tart's breath but there ain't enough man power to put 'em down, Banny doesn't even patrol nowadays, we just sit round the keep and twiddle our thumbs. I'm thinking it's time to get off to farm and ask Ian what price he'll give me for this old sword!"

The soldier laughed in a way that told Arn it was only half a lie and it was all he could do to stop himself buying the man another drink. Just then Speck strode in looking for all the world like the someone had voted him Crown Prince, around his shoulder there was a large leather satchel looking like it had just come out of the tanner's shop. He got to the table that Joseph, Rundell and Febra were idling away the day at as Speck drew up a chair.

"I've got the goods.", chirped Speck with a satisfied look on his face.

"Well then it just remains to get ourselves all packed up and out of here." Joseph saw his friends face darken at those words. He'd said something to disappoint him.

"Look here is it really wise to leave with half the day already spent? Don't any of you remember how miserable it was on the way here? Let's get good and rested before we plod back into the muck again."

"Inns cost money and that eats out of what each of us is going to earn on this job. I say get out now and pay day is that much closer." Febra dabbed her finger pointedly into the table as she made her point, it was apparent that she was uncomfortable sitting around when they had what they'd come for.

"Whether he knows it or not, the lad is right." Rumbled the reclining figure of Rundell from a bench, his words slipping from pursed lips that held a clay pipe. "If you break out of here half through a day you're gonna spend an extra half day on the road at the very least. It's sod's law, or Rundell's whichever way you choose to see it. Start fresh and get the best first day's travel in that you can while you're all fat from the inn food." The note of aged wisdom in his voice seemed to close the argument even though the old trooper had never so much as lifted his head, now it seemed he considered the matter resolved and was dozing back into whatever dream of lost glory he had emerged from.

"Well,", Speck added, "That's handy. Because Karl invited me out to the battle site south of town and I wouldn't want to let the duffer down, what with him being a patron and all."

Arn chuckled, "Patron is it? Guess you took a liking to him did you? Book worms together I suppose."

"I'll come along with you." Joseph said, "But you'd better leave that", he pointed to the satchel, "with these three here. It stands out a bit and we don't want it swiped on our first day."

Speck ruefully handed over the satchel to Arn, who tucked it under Rundells grey head as a pillow. "You couldn't get a copper out from under that old bugger.", he noted.

The site wasn't difficult to spot from the southerly Bannermane road, if road wasn't too grandiose a term for the pair of worn ruts that indicated this direction was used regularly by wagons, if not actually very frequently. As the road began curving to the west they found the archaeologists place of interest, marked out by a great number of staves planted firmly into the ground with different coloured strips of cloth tied at the tops. For a while they thought that Karl had come out to the site and just wandered about the diggings, seeing nothing of interest and a lot of mud but as they headed over to the furthest reaches of the diggings they came upon the scholar kneeling down in a recently excavated section, his sackcloth surcoat protecting his everyday clothes and trouser knees from the soil. In his hands he held a y-shaped stick, gently balancing the divining rod with index fingers and thumbs, eyes intent on the wobbling tip of the device. The practice of divining was familiar to the two boys as it was a common enough practice for finding fresh-water wells in most villages but neither of them had heard of divining for artefacts. Karl looked up at the patiently waiting pair and treated them to a rueful smile.

"It would seem that I've made a bad choice of excavation site this time around. Not a sniff of metal in the whole twenty rods square. It could be that I'm not using this darned thing right,", he indicated the divining stick, "but so far it's increased my success at finding relics a hundred fold."

"You divine for metal?"

"Yes, indeed. I see that sceptical look in your eye Speck but some of my finest finds here at Bannermane are directly attributable to the use of this rod. I make no mention of it in my monologues because a good deal of the scholastic consider divining to be a peasant practice or worse.  But let me show the proof, my field office is just over here and besides", he grimaced up at the sky, "I think it's going to rain again."

They followed Karl over a wide segment of the moor like ground that surrounded Bannermane. Joseph wondered at where the hardy scholars hide out might actually be since there seemed no cover for miles around, it was difficult to move across the moor at anything more than a quick walk because of the tricky ground, one could easily twist an ankle. He hated to think of the problems that a charging army might encounter. Just as he was musing over these fact he found that he was standing on the edge of a small depression in the moorland, it dipped below the line of the surrounding ground by twice his own height and at the centre there was a stone doorway leading to what must be a partially underground structure. Karl explained that these shake-holes were located in many spots across the moor and that they occurred completely naturally. This one had been used centuries ago by a recluse who constructed the stone hideaway, it was virtually impossible to find without being intimately familiar with the sparse terrain and offered excellent protection from the elements. Inside the retreat there was almost as much room as Karl's office in Bannermane, the archaeologist had installed an iron stove and somehow constructed a tough looking set of storage cupboards each with a padlock holding them closed. Struggling under his sackcloth to get some keys out of his pocket, the proud resident finally unlocked two of the doors and swung them out wide so that he could inspect the contents. The first was perfectly ordinary and contained a lot of the items the boys would expect at such a locale, jars of preserved food, hard bread, tinder boxes, blankets and a host of well thought out essentials from which Karl selected a kettle and a tinder box and went to work on the stove. The second contained a bizarre array of relics carefully arranged for display, much as they might have been at a university exhibition. The central piece was a magnificent helm, it's surface covered in mother-of-pearl and edges trimmed with gold, the shape was entirely wrong for any human head, vastly too wide and seemingly made for someone with no forehead but with eyes very wide apart, the nose guard was extremely wide and the opalescent surface seemed to make the eye holes stare vacantly.

It didn't take long for Karl to get a kettle boiling and make three bowls of tea, presumably containing some of the local herbs. He settled himself in a chair by the stove while Speck and Joseph shared a crude dirtwood bench.

"Image the town of Bannermane stripped of it's civilian buildings and manned by a proper complement of soldiers.", he began, "it seems clear that the invaders landed on the coastline in large numbers to the north of the town and since Bannermane is set some three miles from the coast they were able to formalise the army before marching on the stronghold. It would appear that the invaders took Bannermane with almost no effort in a matter of hours, maybe a day, but were then halted from marching on by a large Vedian force holding the foothills to the south. Thus a large invasion force was compelled to become a defensive unit quartered in Bannermane which was too small to accommodate their entire number, they didn't abort the invasion and return to their ship for some reason, perhaps honour, perhaps not. Instead they chose to hold what they had and stand, it could be they believed that Bannermane was defensible enough to be a great thorn in the Vedian kingdoms side and would stretch a nation already fighting on it's southern front. In response the kingdom formed a large task force, from my own estimates it's size should have easily smashed the invader's weak hold on this northern territory. However there appears to have been some great military blunders that made the battle cost the kingdom vastly more than one would expect, one point I have noted is that there was some attempt at cavalry charges at the exposed forces that could not be housed with the fort itself. No doubt these mounted attacks would be dismal failures, for as you have seen the terrain surrounding the town is terribly pitted and many of the horses would have been lost even before the charge arrived at the enemy. The battle was eventually won by the Vedian's at a terrible loss as the invaders never appear to have retreated and fought to the death. The final historical outcome of this battle is clear, that despite winning the Vedian forces became crippled and confidence in the monarchy to run the campaign effectively must have been shattered. This is what we know, but the why's and how's remain a mystery."

Speck remained lost in the description of the conflict for some time after it's narrator had finished while Joseph went back to the cabinet of relics and looked at them in the light of this new information. One question burned bright in the young man's mind and he finally asked it out loud.

"Where did they come from?"

"I wish I could tell you the answer to that one Joseph but there has been no work on the battle sites in the south and any artefacts that I have unearthed here only tell me that they were strange and exotic but match none of the very limited information we have about places outside Vedian."

Finishing their tea both boys thanked the academic for his hospitality and wished him luck in his endeavours but as they trudged back toward the town in the fading light his story returned to them again and again, they were walking the very path that the invaders took to storm the town, a town which they snuffed the life from in fleeting hours, a horror rushing in from the sea and bringing sure death with it. The subdued mood followed them into the common room of the tavern and they retired without taking part in the happy banter that both Febra and Arn seemed dedicated to. Speck retrieved their precious cargo from Rundell who was sipping ale by the fireplace and grumbled slightly at the boy removing the item. Now the little scholar had his chance, it seemed that the book was almost asking him to read it, promising him insight and knowledge that was unavailable to others. Taking the book into their room he bade goodnight to Joseph who slumped on a bed and fell into a heavy sleep. Drawing a tattered blanket that served as a modesty curtain he lit a fat tallow candle and rested it on the shelf by the bed. Carefully he unstrapped the leather bag and unwrapped the protective layers around the book whose clasp shone invitingly in the flickering light. With reverence speck unbarred the clasps and pulled them open, waiting just a few moments before he swung the heavy cover open and looked at the first page. There appeared to be no title and the author seemed to have launched into tightly packed clear writing without any of the usual pleasantries such as a preface or notes. For a while Speck stared at different pages in despair, their was no place from which to gain any intellectual leverage in the book, no illustrations with captions, no tables and the text itself was formed from characters that seemed to have almost infinite variance. He closed his eyes tightly in a moment of frustration and cursed himself for being so egotistical as to think that he could solve what a fine scholar could not. With his eyes closed he could still remember the form of the lines he had just read but it faded away uncomprehended and tantalising only once his thoughts lapsed into silence did the memory distort and somehow become other. Speck did not immediately notice the effect and dolefully flicked through the pages only when a irksome sense of missing something came over him did he close his eyes and concentrate again on the passage before him. He urged his mind to keep the remembrance clear in his mind's eye but such is the devil of memory that he couldn't retain it for long without any understanding of it and besides nothing was being revealed by this form of mental inspection. Just as he ceased the thought experiment the passage became full of mental texture, such as when one remembers the taste of an orange or recalls the feel of a horses coat. This experience was like a sudden recall of many such textures but the sensation passed in fleeting moments. If he could simply quiet his mind from interfering in the process then Speck believed he could unlock a great deal more. He chose another page at random and stared at the first passage for forty heartbeats, all the while calming himself down and trying to surmise nothing from what he was seeing, simply to be an open mind. His eyelids gently shut and immediately the passage gained the mental dimensions he had briefly experience before but now his observance was engulfed in the fragmented perceptions of shape, taste, light, sound and smell. He could still hear his heart beating but the sound became fainter along with all other senses of his corporeal sense and as it did so the perception from passage became joined, linking to each other as the world links every coexistent thing until suddenly he was observing a road that pierced the heart of a forest without himself having any given standpoint. He was simply there, knowing every angle of the scene, every fragrance and sound at once - it was a giddy feeling of omniscience.