The Sceptre of Samnos

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.'"