reading. There
were a lot of names and dates, but no personal commentary or interesting
asides. I skimmed them both, stopping only for detailed reading when I saw the
character for “Saghred.” History was written by the victors, and during the
time the goblin royal family had the Saghred in their arsenal, they had more
than their fair share of victories. There was plenty of smiting, laying waste,
conquering, and enslaving going on, but no explanation of how the Saghred had
actually done any of the above. What I did get was an all-too-comprehensive
picture of just how much damage the Saghred had done during its heyday—and how
much damage I might be able to do now.
Rudra
Muralin’s name was mentioned often, which made sense, seeing that he was the
one telling the Saghred who to smite and what to lay waste to. On one page, he
was called something else.
Saghred
bond servant.
My
hand had been resting on the page just below those words. I moved it, resisting
the urge to wipe my hand on something, anything. Sarad Nukpana had told me
yesterday that I was the bond servant to the Saghred, like my father before me.
I set
the history book aside and quickly reached for Rudra Muralin’s journal. It was
a much smaller book, its pages yellowed with age and held together by a band of
leather wrapped around the middle. From what I knew about him, Muralin had been
like a bully on a playground—except his playgrounds had been cities or
battlefields, and thousands of people had died for the sake of his childish
curiosity. It sounded like Sarad Nukpana hadn’t fallen far from the crazy
shaman tree that had sprouted Rudra Muralin.
The
paper of Muralin’s journal was brittle and dry with age, but the information was
anything but dry reading. There was page after page of what he had asked the
Saghred to help him do. None of Muralin’s antics were anything I’d ever
repeat—and I would never do what he did to get that power. Before he did
anything significant with the Saghred, Rudra Muralin would sacrifice captives
to the stone, feeding its power with all the consideration one would give to
throwing logs on a fire.
Sacrifices
fed the stone, but it wasn’t what Muralin had used to awaken the Saghred,
direct its power, and then put it to sleep afterward.
Rudra
Muralin had been a spellsinger. A young, talented, really powerful spellsinger.
Like
Piaras.
There
was a knock at the door. I almost jumped out of my skin.
Vegard
looked at me and I nodded once. I closed Muralin’s journal and put my hand over
it. Vegard partially opened the door and looked out.
He
stepped back and Nelek slipped through and closed the door quickly behind him.
From
the look on his face, he wasn’t the bearer of good news. “Ma’am, Chief
Librarian Kalta has requested that I collect the books. He said to tell you
that three hours is ample time for your study.”
Vegard
said the exact word I was thinking.
“I’m
sorry, sir.”
“Not
your fault, Nelek.”
The
librarian pulled a slender leather-bound book out of his robes and handed it to
me.
“I
thought this might be of interest to you,” he said. “It was written in the last
century by a goblin historian named Okon Nusair. It’s an obscure work about the
legends surrounding the Saghred. Since Nusair didn’t document the sources of
much of his information, it’s considered fiction by serious scholars. It’s
rarely checked out. Paladin Eiliesor may not have been aware of its existence.”
Nelek looked nervously at the closed door. “The chief librarian is in a meeting
and I could tell him I was unavoidably delayed in fulfilling his request.”
I
gave him as much of a smile as I could. “Thank you. I appreciate your help.”
The
librarian smiled shyly and shrugged. “At the very least, it’s a good companion
volume to Rudra Muralin’s work.”
The
book felt smooth and almost pliant under my hands. Creepy.
I
opened it and flipped through the still-crisp pages. I shouldn’t have
were a lot of names and dates, but no personal commentary or interesting
asides. I skimmed them both, stopping only for detailed reading when I saw the
character for “Saghred.” History was written by the victors, and during the
time the goblin royal family had the Saghred in their arsenal, they had more
than their fair share of victories. There was plenty of smiting, laying waste,
conquering, and enslaving going on, but no explanation of how the Saghred had
actually done any of the above. What I did get was an all-too-comprehensive
picture of just how much damage the Saghred had done during its heyday—and how
much damage I might be able to do now.
Rudra
Muralin’s name was mentioned often, which made sense, seeing that he was the
one telling the Saghred who to smite and what to lay waste to. On one page, he
was called something else.
Saghred
bond servant.
My
hand had been resting on the page just below those words. I moved it, resisting
the urge to wipe my hand on something, anything. Sarad Nukpana had told me
yesterday that I was the bond servant to the Saghred, like my father before me.
I set
the history book aside and quickly reached for Rudra Muralin’s journal. It was
a much smaller book, its pages yellowed with age and held together by a band of
leather wrapped around the middle. From what I knew about him, Muralin had been
like a bully on a playground—except his playgrounds had been cities or
battlefields, and thousands of people had died for the sake of his childish
curiosity. It sounded like Sarad Nukpana hadn’t fallen far from the crazy
shaman tree that had sprouted Rudra Muralin.
The
paper of Muralin’s journal was brittle and dry with age, but the information was
anything but dry reading. There was page after page of what he had asked the
Saghred to help him do. None of Muralin’s antics were anything I’d ever
repeat—and I would never do what he did to get that power. Before he did
anything significant with the Saghred, Rudra Muralin would sacrifice captives
to the stone, feeding its power with all the consideration one would give to
throwing logs on a fire.
Sacrifices
fed the stone, but it wasn’t what Muralin had used to awaken the Saghred,
direct its power, and then put it to sleep afterward.
Rudra
Muralin had been a spellsinger. A young, talented, really powerful spellsinger.
Like
Piaras.
There
was a knock at the door. I almost jumped out of my skin.
Vegard
looked at me and I nodded once. I closed Muralin’s journal and put my hand over
it. Vegard partially opened the door and looked out.
He
stepped back and Nelek slipped through and closed the door quickly behind him.
From
the look on his face, he wasn’t the bearer of good news. “Ma’am, Chief
Librarian Kalta has requested that I collect the books. He said to tell you
that three hours is ample time for your study.”
Vegard
said the exact word I was thinking.
“I’m
sorry, sir.”
“Not
your fault, Nelek.”
The
librarian pulled a slender leather-bound book out of his robes and handed it to
me.
“I
thought this might be of interest to you,” he said. “It was written in the last
century by a goblin historian named Okon Nusair. It’s an obscure work about the
legends surrounding the Saghred. Since Nusair didn’t document the sources of
much of his information, it’s considered fiction by serious scholars. It’s
rarely checked out. Paladin Eiliesor may not have been aware of its existence.”
Nelek looked nervously at the closed door. “The chief librarian is in a meeting
and I could tell him I was unavoidably delayed in fulfilling his request.”
I
gave him as much of a smile as I could. “Thank you. I appreciate your help.”
The
librarian smiled shyly and shrugged. “At the very least, it’s a good companion
volume to Rudra Muralin’s work.”
The
book felt smooth and almost pliant under my hands. Creepy.
I
opened it and flipped through the still-crisp pages. I shouldn’t have
Similar Books
