The Warrior of Ellyul

 The Shembirian Scribe Kalletus states that "Madabar the Regal saw how Althai son of Eldan, growing in piety, knowledge, and military power, influenced the various tribes of Shemirian nomads, mages, Virhians, Mabbites, and other outlanders, who then began to observe the customs of the Eldanite Clans of which one Althai was to become leader," thereby provoking the entrenched Shemirian oligarchs. 

 A plot developed among these Shemirian oligarchs to stall Althai son of Eldan's reignhood over the first of the Western citadels. They made diplomatic compact with the devious White Iridian mage Seneschal-Warrior Lord Rad Kalbag, and promised him an economic aid of spices, gold and gems, and iridia, should he make a military expedition against Althai son of Eldan. Lord Rad Kalbag agreed, and mounted an expeditionary force.

 ******

 Althai son of Eldan watched, impassively upon the head-mount, the masses of his troops. Camp-fires cast shadows across the tents. The soldiers waited, their banded armors, spears, shields and swords glimmering and pantaloon-trousers and helmet-penants flapping in the indigo midnight of the canyon below. Through marshy headlands rivers and fertile streams trickled, and the wind-swift archer's horses of the loyalist soldiers of the Shemirian kingdom of Ellyu'l drank their fill.

 The traitors within his realm, those whom had not the light of devotion, but the chauvinistic and fiery prejudices of the old gods of the pre-Shemirian peoples before the coming of the El Yu'l dynasty, prepared their armaments in the vale next. They had been the unwitting pawns of The Western Shemirian confederation of Citadels' larger designs. He, Althai son of Eldan, elected Warrior-Prince of the realm of the Shelshev Rivers and the Mountains of Anach, swore not let the machinations of foreign rulers corrupt the dawning of a new era in his kingdom of his highland, his kingdom by right of the divine decree. 

 From the bonds of rulership had his line been borne, but the ways of the Ellyuri had renewed him. A new day should dawn across the valleys of Western Shemiria, the land of Ellur, and the Eldan — one day the Annointed of the Ellyuri would reform them of their ancient rites and sacrifices to mute extravagant gods which did not speak but demanded the spirit of their devotees.

With a strong hand, fresh from the brazier of the washing-water, Althai son of Eldan brushed his stout shock of blackish-red hair, the hue of blacksmith’s iron cooling by the fire-light, his wide shoulders and strength commanding the indigo-hued shadows of the near-darkness. 

He looked toward the West, across the plains of the Western Shemiria, across to the city of Tifan, and Amon-Sophtris, where the Temple of Amon-Soph yet stood, re-invigorated by the faith of the Cascarradi Monks, and his visage warmed. Althai son of Eldan looked across the azure waters of the Greater Inland Sea, and the isles of the seas upon it, to the darker waters, and the wicked scheming of the various Citadels of Dark Fire. The darkness of the empire that was Uur-Goth.

The combined armies of the King Lord Rad Kalbag, passing across the Tripura Rivers and marching across the bridges which had not been destroyed by his retreating forces, met up with the traitorous forces of the Shemirian deserters of his campaign army. The southern post-fortresses had been compromised by the plotting of the Resachite-Renegade front. Golden coins had glimmered and exchanged the palms of one to another, and confusion had been sewn in among the ranks of the Cascarradi loyalists. 

Althai son of Eldan, having foreseen treachery, had called up the majority of his infantry forces in the weeks before to regroup and prepare for battles above the Tripura Rivers. By courier, winged messenger and hand-scroll, the spies among the renegades had informed Althai son of Eldan of their movements toward his walled capital. He prepared special archers and cavalry forces for the battles with the invaders. 

By town and glade, ravine and gully, Althai son of Eldan had trapped Lord Rad Kalbag's armies and resigned them to the swift warfare of the archer, the deadly Shemirian mount who would slay from any position, and at the speed of the stallion of the four winds, nary a chain-armored soldier, whether traitor or camel-riding Resachite, would withstand the incisive and mortal damages of the Cascarradi arrow-shafts. 

Beneath their black-and-silver banners, their market-drivers of twisted avenues and slave-traders, the desert nomads of the south should plan to raise his holy city, Illyur and re-install the priests of Itamaf, the worshipers of the fire. Yet it was those who believed in that ur-religion, of the people not of the regal, horse-riding blood of elite monk-warrior Cascarradi, but of the aboriginal of the Amon-Sophtrian plateau, whom in some ancient time, had exported their beliefs in the harsh lords of fire and the avatars of death, to the peaceable people of the hills and mountains above the land where Ellur once lived. 

This Althai son of Eldan forsook. He turned from the East, genuflecting in the manner of Ellyuri, the dwindling sunsets rays enveloping his body, arms outstretched in prayer. He bowed and unwrapped the head-dress from his torso. 

The soldier-general prayed for the blessing of his kine strong in form and devotion, many more than the twelve sons of the founder of Ellyuri, his ancestor. The Prince of Ellyur, having completed his evening devotions, garbed for battle. Plated-mail protected his torso and midsection — he wore leather-scale over trousers, and hard-leather boots. 

 “Althai son of Eldan," called an advisor. Althai son of Eldan turned. The pale-faced man, wan of face, ever intelligent of demeanor, approached, his purplish robes engirdled with scrolls and a simple dagger for armament. The advisor’s long, dark hair, shone in the torch-light. Althai son of Eldan walked across the camp toward the rough-canopied commanders' tent as the men conversed. "Speak, Tar'Tegen," said Althai son of Eldan. 

"The commanders of the traitors of the southern command have been brought to camp," said Tar'Tegen. 

 ******

 The traitors walked silently up the mount-hill, as if they had not eaten. Their faces drawn, their armor clanked, their kilts and trousers shuffling, their line bent. A few looked at Althai son of Eldan, the darkness illuminating sagging chins and brows recessed. "Halt," said General Bektar the Wise, a dark-haired, robust man of short temper. 

 The line stopped and the royal guards, their helmets plumed moved quickly among the prisoners, checking them for weaponry, making firm the iron bounds which kept them. "Sit," commanded Bektar the Wise, his armored girth moving along the line. The prisoners of war settled to the ground, chains clanking.

 The guards approached the line of the twenty traitors — every other traitor faced a guard, motionless before them, sabres in hand. In the darkness it was difficult to discern their individuality, from their backs hung capes, their plated-armor dull and merciless in the torch-lights. 

 Althai son of Eldan spoke, his tall frame gesturing to one and the next, his tunic draping from his arm, sword clattering in his belt as his boots swept across the hardened earth. "Thee who pledged to the Crown of Ellyul, of the realm of Ellyur, hath not god but The Lord of Hosts, to ask for forgiveness." Althai son of Eldan drew his sword and approached the first traitor. He raised his head slightly, his black hair limp across his cheekbones and the nape of his neck low. 

 The humid riverine night buzzed with flies, and the cries of far-off animals. Althai son of Eldan raised the palm of his hand, clutching his cutlass-sword, as honed and sharp as the fangs of a canid champion, and pointed its terrible point into the throat of the leader of the traitors of Ellyul. 

 ******

 Walled ramparts of the wooden and stone fortress loomed behind the army of Althai son of Eldan. Beyond, in the fresh morn they set out across the verdant plains southward toward the opposite valley where the armies of Lord Rad Kalbag lay in wait. The spring-like winds and meadows littered the river valleys and hillsides, and the glades were exuberant.

 His train marched and rode in unison, thousands strong. The couriers and advisors ran in preparation, to and from the camp, their steely tattoo and mounts hooves echoing across the way. Althai son of Eldan and Bektar the Wise rode in the front, beneath the banners of the Kingdom of Ellyul, the sunlight bright through their heralds. 

When the army had reached the ridge before the rising of the valley, Althai son of Eldan ordered a halt — he received word from a courier that Lord Rad Kalbag's army had begun to dwindle toward the south. Althai son of Eldan whispered to the courier and the lithe man ran with swiftness toward the back of the camp, signaling for a rider's horse.

 At stake was not merely the sacred name of the Cascarradi, the rightful heir of their dynasty, that of Althai son of Eldan, and the majestic mountains and valleys which housed their kingdom, Ellyur. Beyond were the trade routes of the Royal Road of Western Shemir, which passed from that clever and kingdom wise in the arts of fire-warfare and wars of the spirit to the southeast. He who controlled the mountain passes above the Tripura River, controlled the route of trade to Shambirian lands, and the lucrative Uur-Gothian world beyond. For the power of the markets oft decided the fates of the kingdoms.

 Treacherous Resachites, led by Lord Rad Kalbag's forces, emanated beyond Opis and Resach from the cities and countryside of northern Lord, Rad Kalbag, and in their counterweight to the rising power of Eldan, did the Cascarradi fight against. Yet the cruel and conniving Saarkra priests of the Shemirian kingdom should not let the Shemiris regain their foothold in the Temple of Amon-Sophtris — to this the Uur-Gothians were agreed. The wing-footed spies of Althai son of Eldan, in the land of Eldan had confirmed the efforts of the Uur-Gothian diplomats in a secret treaty with the ruling priesthood of The Shemiri. 

 Althai son of Eldan looked toward the horizon, and to the lands beyond the Mountains of Avil. There, riding on the steeds of their forebears, quick and powerful of haunch and hoof, were the alert brethren of the Cascarradi, biding their time upon the steppes of the fearsome plains. The Prince turned, his ebony locks aglow in the sunlight beneath his iron helm, as Tar'Tegen approached him on back a greyish steed, small and fleet of foot. "Althai son of Eldan," he said, "news comes from the messengers of the front." The renegade army moves at the evening-tide. 

"Where shall they move now?" asked Althai son of Eldan. 

"Their movement is in the left flank of their center phalanx-group," explained Tar'Tegen. "It appears they are moving their right phalanx-group away to encircle us." 

"Then call for the second army according to our battle plans," ordered Althai son of Eldan.

Tar'Tegen made the sign of the Priesthood of Ellyul, and turned his horse about to follow Althai son of Eldan, passing a scroll-note to a horseman to his side, whom in turned passed it to a horseman beyond him. 

 To make any strategic decisions this close to the battlefield would be an obvious move for Lord Rad Kalbag's spies. After a few moments the message for the surrounding-attack of the renegade armies circulated. The special cavalry units of Ellyul would soon be alerted from their hidden locations to the north and east. 

 ****** 

His saturnine features mixed with fury and indecision. He suspected Althai son of Eldan's armies would surprise him in counterattack, but he could not yet discern which type of counter-attack they would utilize. Lord Rad Kalbag sequestered in his black tent, banner of this city-kingdom of flapping in the high breezes. He pored over a battle-map, aquiline nose and swarthy features rimmed with sweat. 

 The western satrapies were faltering beneath the combined pressure of the Shemirian front, and the force of their confederated culture was driving worry into the administrators of Resach. The controllers of Lord Rad Kalbag had proposed a potent mixture of bribery and economic subversion to break the southwestern edges of Ellyur, all the while hungering for Illyur, the crown jewel of the Cascarradi dynasty and the Mountain Fortress of the southern Tripura delta region. 

First had come the death of Lantares under the Cascarradi Magan the Great. The Shemirians had captured the farthern West reaches of the Mitranite Barrens, controlling an invasion point into the former Empire of the East, under the scion-generals of the King. Then, moving his victorious forces westward, Magan conquered the southeastern Eldani kingdoms, driving a stake through the heart of the Saarkra kingdom. Next, Resachite regions on the southwestern edges of the expanding Shemirian Empire succumbed to the horse-riders cavalry onslaught, nearly fallow of defenders after their defeat. In the summer, Magan captured Sakkara, and later the farthern vassal kingdoms of Uur-Goth near the edges of the Lord Rad Kalbag's dark citadel. 

 But that was two hundred years ago, before the ascent of the Uur-Gothians into the kingdoms and empires of Western Shambiria, before the regaining of Eldan by the tribes of Eldan and the re-installation of their Temple of Amon-Soph. Their powers advanced eastward. The Shemirians had regained their old powers and extended as far as the Ramasarati, regaining old trade routes of El Shambiria. 

 Lord Rad Kalbag rolled up the scroll of strategy, his sweaty fist placing it into his vestment-pocket. He arose from his tent and pondered, pacing the dirt floors while scenarios played through his mind. In a few hours the battle against the Shemirians should commence. He shuddered, remembering the fate of the Resachian Dar Kondar, whom in desperation attempted to regain lands lost to the Resach, but was defeated and captured by the Shemirians. 

 Lord Rad Kalbag's citadel and Resach were weakening beneath the weight of the Uur-Gothian imperium. Amply compensated by the hidden Uur-Gothian hand, to take for his own hoard the wealth of the Shemirians, he chose war. 

The Lord Rad Kalbag's armies swirled about, milling numbers flashing in chain-mail and silver. They were confused, and the elite horse-cavalry of the Shemirians rode to the east and west, drawing their numbers in one direction and the next as the merciless arrows of the Denemendi archers burrowed into the chests and heads of their Kalbag foes. They annihilated their fortified positions for the launching of flamed bitumen, hot blood running slick across the splendid valleys of Ellyur. 

 The traitorous ranks of the southwestern Shemirian kingdoms had been thinned. The bodies of the wicked lined the plains of the river valley, spent armor and horses dim in the muddy field. 

Althai son of Eldan raised his horse, gripping his reddened sword tightly on pommel, his large and sturdy hands sure of the victory he had prayed the Lord of Ellyuri should deliver. He hacked and hewed as horse-riding swordsman rode a grassy hill, upturned in places with the slain of Shemirian and Lord Rad Kalbag horsemen and infantry, the Resachites' black hair and tawny skin glittering in the afternoon sun. Althai son of Eldan's shield-man blocked another attack, clashing, fending off Resachian metallurgy with Shemirian honed blades and skill. 

 The Champion of Ellyul looked over the field toward the enemy's black banner; and sitting upon his horse was a large man, dark of feature, his chain-mail ringing as he drove off the vicious blade of the Shemirian host. "Lord Rad Kalbag," Althai son of Eldan spoke. His greenish eyes narrowed in fury, his dusky skin growing reddish with hate-pallor. He grabbed the sword-hilt as the word of the Lord, his arm, like the Arm of the Lord of Hosts. 

 "We attack that scourge!" Althai son of Eldan cried, and a coterie of his elite swordsmen followed his stallion, charging across the hilltop and down the muddied slope, hacking and slaying the invaders, blade-arms heavy with fatigue. Althai son of Eldan knew the field of battle well, and the Resachite intruder had foolishly risked invasion in the homeland of the Cascarradi. 

The black stallion raced down the field toward a valley range. Lord Rad Kalbag had fled with a contingent of his elite soldiers toward his rear guard and train, which had dwindled as reinforcements were erroneously called to the battle, and had been entrapped for slaughter by Althai son of Eldan's sharp-shooting Shemirian archer-horsemen. Their accuracy was known through The Resach lands and the great continent of Irynia, and their mention made the centurions of Uur-Goth hesitate. For at any turn in their saddle could their unleashed recumbent bows find their targets, even at hundreds of feet yonder. 

Lord Rad Kalbag's mount hurdled toward the stony embankment — beyond the mist-laden hilltops where the cream of the Shemirian countryside farmed and lived. The Shemirians grew valuable crops along the Royal Road, such as the Girian spices, known to grow throughout Central and East Shambiria and in the case of Ellyurians' interest, the central West Shemirian plateau south of the Ellyurians lands and the Lesser Inland Seas basin, a cooking agent, stimulant, and medicine. 

 The Resachite's coal-black eyes, rounded and slightly protuberant, narrowed. His aquiline features breathed and burned. All was fair in war, he recalled — it wasn't for naught that the Saarkra design should include as capable a warrior as his clan of Resachite royalty. 

 Lord Rad Kalbag did not answer but swerved his descent. His company moved toward the south, their black fast steeds running sure over the rocky terrain. It began to incline, and their hooves beat over the stony ground like the crashing of hailstones. The peaks of the mountains, ancient of days, loomed in the distance — their snow-capped peaks housing by tradition as old as the inhabitants of these lands, the Keep of Eldan. 

 Lord Rad Kalbag's company coursed over the ridge, and below, a road appeared. To his east, a company of Shemirian infantry and cavalry, their banded armors gleaming in the sunlight, swords and bows at the ready, their shields as strong as oaks. Lord Rad Kalbag turned to his west, and the Shemirian fortress Keep of the Three Vales stood as a great rock-walled sentinel. 

 A hail of whistling shafts of Shemirian make struck the dark, billow-robed chain mail of the Resachites, their dying moans mixing with the terrible rain. Their armor useless before the piercing arrowheads, they collected their shields as Lord Rad Kalbag, cursing commanded them toward the fortress. The Resachite general rallied his horse and went swiftly for the secondary gate, as more arrows rained upon his troops and horses, slaying several. His hand-chosen renegade archers matched the Shemirian defenders and they too fell from their parapets. 

 Althai son of Eldan gave chase, ordering his men to surround Keep of the Three Vales from the East, for before the fortress stood a craggy hill. No invader could access it from its difficult and narrow path traverse. Lord Rad Kalbag's men rushed the portal, hacking at its wooden door, and four men manned a battering-lance. The crashes resounded against the Shemirian doorway. Lord Rad Kalbag wrestled at his beard, for here was the secret storehouse of the girian spices, and treasures of silver and gold, jewels of the Shemirian kingdoms and the plunder of her enemies. 

 Hails of arrows fell upon Lord Rad Kalbag's hapless troops, skulls split and shoulders rent, and finally the door gave. But Althai son of Eldan's soldiers attacked their flanks, and the shields of the renegade army did repel. They were now outnumbered, and their morale began to tear. Some cried for their Lord Rad Kalbag gods of the sand and sea, as they perished, one by one, and their dark oaths to serpentine forces unnoticed and unheard. 

 Lord Rad Kalbag rode in with his bodyguard of eight hand-chosen soldiers, their swords and scimitars slicing across the Shemirian defenders. The hooves of Althai son of Eldan's horse gained, and his men, numbering in the hundreds, poured across the valley toward the entrapped fortress Keep of the Three Vales, whence the Lord Rad Kalbag generals should meet their dooms. 

 The halls were dusty, but well-trod, adorned with the complex designs of the ancients, and the Amon-Sophtrians of long past, tho' the Eldanis had sworn to wear the banner of the Ellyuri, their golden wares and champions-afield greeting the inhabitants, and the design of the Eternal Light Stone in the Temple of Amon-Soph, which the royalty had designated to the Shemiris as a gift to the Shemiri state and the sciences and devotions of the Temple. 

 The battlements formed outside were mute as Lord Rad Kalbag raced in terror across the hallways, the echoing clatter of his steeds terrible to the ear. He looked wildly about — his saturnine visage aghast with encroaching horror. The standards of the Ellyuri, and the horsemen of Hyperborea, the far northern Aksharans, appeared like apparitive night-mares before his dwindling men.

 Althai son of Eldan broke across the broken portal-door, his men in tow. At the Prince's order, the arrows of his best archers unleashed, flew true to their marks down the long hallways of the fortress Keep of the Three Vales, and the last of Lord Rad Kalbag's men fell from their horses. They wracked in pain as the wood-grains and iron-smithy of Ellyur burned like fire through their corpses. 

 Lord Rad Kalbag turned a corner, striking a Shemirian fortress-guard before he could mount his spear toward the Resachite. He fell to the hard floor lifeless. The hallway was blocked, and Lord Rad Kalbag reared his steed, and dismounted. Terrified, he ran to a stairwell. Its helix curved upward toward the levels above. Clutching his iron tightly, he ran as his heavy body thudded upon the steps, e'en as Althai son of Eldan and his men turned the corner. 

 The second floor was a maze of corridors, and the din of the Shemirians approaching soldiers made him choose doorways for hiding. He pulled on the knob of one oaken door, yet it was latched from the inside and would not budge. The din of soldiers' boots crashed across the packed floors. Lord Rad Kalbag ran down the hallway and faced another forked pathway. He ran down the left in hopes of eluding the force and catching a steed incognito. 

 "Lord Rad Kalbag!" A soldier called from beyond, or Althai son of Eldan, he could not say.

The empty hallway beckoned, and a bright window displayed the mountains beyond. Lord Rad Kalbag hurried toward the sunlight, his dark features streaked with the sun-beams of the peaks of Mount Tashar. In a frenzy he broke down a doorway, and the room was dark. The door closed behind him, and he shut it. Here was silence — and he could not see; a tunnel loomed beyond.

Epilogue 

It is said that after Lord Rad Kalbag's army invaded the Shemirian headlands, passing across the Tripura Rivers and north, Shemirian traitors deserted Althai son of Eldan's army. Althai held meeting with his generals, and slew the available traitors.

The next day the Eldani's forces were victorious, and the remainder of Rad Kalbag's army fled toward the high Peaks of Balrog. 

THE END

Bio: Jonah Lissner is an accomplished science fiction writer having earned acclaimed magazine, webzine, and anthology publications.

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