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Vantarestin Part 7

     "What's that you've got there?" asked Shaun, indicating the book she was holding.


     "This? I don't know. I found it in this drawer here." She opened it and flicked through the pages. "It looks like a journal. Yes, here's a date, the fourteenth of secautumn 2084. It must be Zebulon's record of life in Vantarestin." She read a short passage. "'Today, Rhanov found half a dozen young men hanging around the main entrance. He opened the outer door to let them in, to see how they'd do against our defences. My illusions didn't seem to worry them, they must have been expecting something of the sort, but when two of them fell down a pit the rest fled. Clearly not recruitment material. Rhanov caught them and brought them to me, so I could cast an amnesia spell on them to make them forget the location of this place. Then we took them some distance away and let them go.'"


     "I figured people must stumble across this place now and then," said Shaun. "I wondered how they dealt with them." He took another volume from the drawer. "Secspring 2086 to summer 2087," he read. He opened it near the middle. "'Nineteenth of forwinter 2086. Another three men fell to the plague last night, bringing the total to fifteen. Unless Rhanov returns with the healers soon, I fear he will have had a wasted journey. I begin to feel the heat of the fever in myself. I feel so helpless. With all my power, I can do nothing at all for either myself or my men. I would trade half of all my power for the healing power of the clerics.'" Diana looked up at this, a little of the anger fading from her face as Shaun turned the pages to see how the crisis had turned out.


     Matthew and Jerry searched through the drawer, looking at the dates on one volume after another before discarding them. "I can't find the current volume," said Jerry at last. "I thought it might say where they'd all gone and why they never came back."


     "It must be here somewhere," said Diana. Some instinct told her that it was vitally important to find that last volume. She started searching the shelves, disturbing Thomas, who scowled at her. Not finding it, she searched the writing desk itself, but it wasn't there either. She then went back out into Zebulon's living room to search the shelves there, and came back a few minutes later with the book clutched triumphantly in her hands. "Found it!" she cried joyfully. "It was just sitting there on the coffee table, as if he wanted us to find it!" She was speaking quickly and excitedly now, certain that she was very close at last to her holy mission. She opened it and read the dates, firsautumn 2087 to the present, or at least to the time when Zebulon, Rhanov and all their men had left. She then turned to the first page and began to read.


     "'Thirty third of firsautumn, 2087. Our patrols surprised another party of shologs and goblins using the main road, and although we destroyed them, the fact that they were there at all, moving so confidently in broad daylight, is very worrying indeed. It is further proof, if proof were needed, that the Shadowhosts are moving again, becoming ever more confident and arrogant as they grow, and that they are gathering for war. Those we destroyed were probably not of the Shadowhosts themselves, but sense the growing strength of evil and are encouraged by it. We have sent messengers to alert the authorities and offer them our help. They will warn them that Ilandia and the rest of the empire must be put on full defensive alert to resist the invasion that must surely come before the end of the century.'"


     She turned a few pages to miss a few days worth of interesting but trivial day to day happenings until she got to another important bit. "'Fourth of secautumn 2087. Our messengers have returned with very bad news. The mighty and glorious High Prefect of Ilandia denies any possibility of a threat from the Shadow, saying that they were beaten so badly in the last war that they would never dare attack us again. The fool cannot see that the reasons for our victory last time no longer apply and that the Shadowhosts know it, gaining confidence from the knowledge. Moreover, although Belthar has grown mightier since the last war, the Shadowarmies have grown by an even greater degree. The margin of our victory was narrow before, it may have entirely vanished by now. Only by taking action now can we hope to stand victorious when the war eventually comes.'"


     "I wonder what he meant by ‘the reasons for our victory last time no longer apply,'" wondered Matthew. "The army won the victory, surely, and the army still exists."


     "Perhaps it's explained further on," said Diana. She turned a few more pages. "Purely routine stuff," she said. "Skirmishes with outlaws and shologs, trouble with the men, that sort of thing. Ah, here's a bit. ‘My despair grows daily. The enemy grows stronger and stronger, more confident and more daring. Even those independently evil creatures, not connected with the Shadow, are becoming ever more of a problem, and the authorities just sit on their fat' er, I think that word means bottoms, ‘twiddling their thumbs and wrapped up in soft warm blankets of complacency. When the invasion comes, and it must come in five or ten years, perhaps sooner, they will catch the empire completely unprepared, and I can only imagine the terrible carnage that will ensue.'"


     "Darris said pretty much the same thing," said Thomas, who had put down his book to listen. "He said that the forest people were making their way into the larger towns, or heading into Ilandia, because of the increase in the numbers of evil creatures roaming the forest."


     "Yes," said Jerry, "and there were a lot more goblins and buglins in Dermakarak than Shale expected. If it's been steadily getting worse for over ten years, then surely the authorities must have noticed."


     "People still remember the horrors of the last war," said Shaun. "Another war is the thing they fear most. They're desperate for peace, so desperate that they refuse to see anything that tells them otherwise." Thomas nodded soberly, remembering some of his father's low voiced conversations with other war veterans when he'd thought his adopted son wasn't listening.


     "Ah, listen to this," said Diana. "'Today I made a decision. If the authorities refuse to help themselves, we may be able to help them ourselves. It has been four hundred years since the Sceptre of Samnos was last claimed and used, and surely this is just the kind of crisis for which it was created. I have decided to search it out and claim it from the Maze.'" Her brows furrowed in puzzlement. "That can't be my holy mission," she said. "Why send a cleric of the Goddess of Healing to find an artifact made by the God of War? It doesn't make sense."


     "Read on," said Shaun.


     Diana turned several pages. "Nothing for several weeks, correction, months," she said. She was well past the middle of the book now, and, judging by the discolouration of the pages, nearing the end of the written record. "Ah, here we are," she said at last. "'At last a breakthrough in my search for information on the Sceptre of Samnos. Verminus managed to find a copy of the Tarranium Mysticum in the library of Tatria, and copied several passages of it for me. A great deal has now been made clear, and I understand why the artifact cannot be claimed from its sanctuary by a priest of Samnos.'" Diana almost dropped the book in her excitement. "'It must be claimed by some other person or persons, and delivered into the hands of a priest of Samnos of the rank of Captain or higher, who alone can use it in battle.


     "'The passages also reveal that Samnos has taken steps to see that no unworthy person can claim the artifact. It is guarded by a great many evil undead creatures, pressed into the service of Samnos in payment for their sins, which must be overcome or bypassed before the Sceptre can be reached. Considering the urgency of the situation, however, I have decided that a little cheating is in order.


     "'I know of the existence of another powerful magical artifact, the Eye of Millandar. It was created centuries ago by the shae folk of the Kingdom of Pharania, and among its many other powers it has the ability to ward off undead creatures. If I can obtain it, it will make the task of retrieving the Sceptre much easier. The only problem, however, is that it is currently held by a Shadowcommander called Garrock, living among the ruins of the town of Gilberton in the Endless Plains, well within the borders of the Shadow. There is a ray of hope, though, in that he does not appear to have reported his ownership of it to his superiors. He apparently wants to use it to his own advantage. The town's defences will be no stronger or better prepared than that of any other Shadow stronghold, therefore, because they have no way of knowing that it contains such a desirable treasure. A sudden quick raid, in and out, to seize the Eye and escape, may therefore well succeed.


     "'Rhanov has expressed serious doubts about this, saying that it would probably be more dangerous than trying to solve the Maze of Samnos without it, but I was eventually able to talk him around, and we are preparing to leave. We will take our entire army with us, everyone currently resident and all the reserves. There's no point leaving anyone behind to guard Vantarestin, because if we fail, none of us will ever return.'"


     Diana's hands were trembling as she turned two more pages, reaching the very last page of the record.


     "'Nineteenth of Thirwinter, 2087. The midwinter holiday is now over, and we are finally ready to leave. As soon as the last of the men return from their families, we will set off. Rhanov and I have distributed most of our wealth to the families of the men, in case we don't come back, which is a real possibility."


     "'If several years have gone by and there are no further entries in this journal, then you who are reading this will know that we have failed and that our reanimated corpses are serving among the zombie legions of the Shadowarmies. Therefore, I hereby charge you with completing our mission to find and recover the Sceptre of Samnos. I cannot tell you where it is, because I do not know myself, but I recommend that you consult the Emerald Oracle, which is what we are planning to do. Unfortunately, we also have no idea where the Oracle is, but are planning to seek the advice of several notable sages, who may be able to tell us, or who may even be able to give us the location of the Sceptre directly, therefore bypassing the need to consult the Oracle entirely.


     "'Forget about the Eye of Millandar. If we, with our army, cannot get it, then you will have no chance of doing so unless you command an army of at least a thousand men. It may be taken deeper into the Shadow in the aftermath of our failed expedition, maybe even to the city of Arnor itself.


     "'The future of all civilization may depend on you. If you are unable or unwilling to undertake the mission yourself, then I beg you to deliver this journal to the authorities, although I have no hopes that they will do anything.


     "'If you accept this mission, please feel free to help yourselves to anything you find in this complex that may help you. You will, of course, pillage and maybe occupy this place anyway, especially as I have removed most of the magical traps and wards guarding it, but be comforted that you do so with my permission if you take up my mission. Whether you do so or not, I wish you all the good luck that the Gods are willing to give you.' It's signed ‘Zebulon', and has his mark below it."


     She flicked through the remaining pages of the journal, all of which were blank. "That's it," she said sadly. "They never came back." She placed the book reverently down on the table and put her hands together in a prayer, her face radiant with joy and wonder, and also triumph. They'd thought she was crazy, but now they knew she'd been right all along! Her holy mission! "My Lady Caroli," she cried jubilantly, "I humbly accept this mission that You have given me. I will strive to be worthy of the trust You have placed in me. Please give me the strength, the courage and the faith to succeed. Thy will be done!"

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