Episode 69

We like to think that places don’t change

Mountains are fixed and valleys stay the same

So the towns that we love can be left with their culture

Frozen in time like a painting or sculpture

But mountains do move on magma plates

Valleys are carved at glacial pace

And so do towns change in their way

Moulded by them that leave and those who come to stay

Lilian woke up in her childhood bedroom, surprised that she had managed to sleep at all. She remembered being at the Fox and Octopus Inn the night before, talking everyone through today’s final plan. Sage Fenric’s big ceremony was set to take place tomorrow, so they only had one day to carry out the objective. There were many phases and elements and various contingencies put into place. Everyone had a role to play but Lilian was the star of the show as well as its director. She was the only one with real battle experience and knew from her time with Mr Attorcop, Mistress Eleyna and Solveig of the hundred that preparation was an essential ingredient of victory.

Lilian extracted herself from woollen blankets and fur pelts and went to get dressed. It was early, the sun had not quite appeared in the sky but there was still enough light to navigate her room. Fritha stirred at the foot of the bed. Lilian looked back at her and smiled. She was sorry to have to involve her once again in some nasty, violent business. But deep down she knew that the feinhound would do anything to protect her. She knew that because that’s exactly how she felt about Fritha. Lilian thought back to when they’d arrived back in Benlunar. She had expected to be here a few weeks at most. She had expected quiet nights at the inn and boring services at the Stave. The memory nearly made her laugh. If only she’d known.

The Fox and Octopus had been crowded last night. Word had gotten out that a resistance was being formed and so there were more than just the familiar faces to listen and offer help where they could. Lilian didn’t want anyone to directly intervene in anything violent. She gave herself those jobs. But the others would be there, close by, with strict instructions to run away should Fenric or any of the sisters get too close.

Lilian put on some woollen hose and a stitched shirt before turning back to her bed and bending down to extract the large bag from under it. Resting on top of the bag was her staff. It had been given to her by an old man in Freedos; it was carved into the shape of a gnarled tree with a moon nestled in its branches. It was a walking staff really, but it could be used as a weapon if the road proved dangerous. She ran her fingers across it, the polish was still in good condition and she could trace the little lines across the length of it with her fingers. She tested its weight, held it with tight fists and then set it to one side. Then she turned her attention to the bag. Undoing the strings she slowly revealed its contents. The shimmering metal caught the first rays of the sun through her bedroom curtain. It scattered them across the room like a hundred little fire lights. Slowly, Lilian brought out the feinhound helmet and the beaten metal breastplate. Then came the wrist and leg braces, each intricately decorated with carved flowers and beaten little beasts. The suit of armour had been made especially for her by her friend Genevive back in Freedos. A uniform fit for fighting tyranny. She had worn it to defeat Empress Sylvia and It was only apt that she wear it again today. The metal was beaten thinly to allow for increased movement and the ability to synchronise with Lilian’s invisibility.

Setting the armour beside her Lilian reached into the bag for a final time. Her hand gripped the cold metal of the final item. It was her tungsten switch. Gifted to her by a group of noble revolutionaries, the weapon was light and strong. It had no sharp edge, just a rounded length which thinned out at the tip to give the weapon a faster swing speed.

Lilian spent the next few minutes putting on the suit. She found the ritual of it calming. She had to adjust a few of the straps, she was still growing it seemed, but the bulk fit her form well and the helmet sat on her head like a tailored hat. The inside was padded with wool stuffed cloth for comfort and impact absorption. Once the lower jaw shaped chin strap was fastened Lilian picked up the tungsten switch and walked out of the room, to battle.

Once outside the metal of the armour quickly chilled. Lilian knew the cold would weaken the metal somewhat but the plates were only ever meant to protect from slashes anyway. A direct stab would pierce the metal, a fact she knew all too well from the mended hole in the back plate. The thought triggered the memory of her fight with Nicholas Telson and she was going over the mistakes she had made there while watching Fritha run on ahead. The feinhound was in her element, running from tree to tree sniffing at anything that caught her attention.

Suddenly she stopped and stared into the forest. Fritha had paused mid-step and so looked like a pointer who’d just spotted a rabbit in the brush. Lilian followed her gaze and caught sight of some blades shifting on top of a ridge. Lilian instinctively reached for her weapon. Her feet moved into a defensive stance and she was ready to run round and surprise her enemy when she saw a head pop up from behind the ridge with a cheeky giggle.

Lilian breathed a sigh of relief. Then she smiled, waved and motioned for little Emma Glade to come down to see her. The girl scampered over the edge and slid down the road bank to meet her. Emma’s eyes widened at the site of Lilian’s armour. She was so distracted by the intricacy of the designs that she failed to notice Fritha sneaking up on her to give her a big wet lick on her cheek. She giggled again and pushed the feinhound off her.

“What… are… you… doing… here?” Lilian spoke to herself as she signed the words. Emma might not be able to hear her voice but the movement of the lips helped with the signs. She watched the little girl gesture a reply. Lilian caught the words help and Fenric. Emma was signing quickly and so Lilian motioned for her to slow down. Emma rolled her eyes, frustrated again by Lilian’s slowness in picking up her language. Lilian watched her answer the question and went through the words in her mind.

Saw Fenric today. The sisters are getting ready. They know you. They know you are going there.

Lilian nodded and thanked Emma for the information. In truth she had expected this. Benlunar was a small place and Fenric was bound to have someone watching the Fox and Octopus. Word of their meeting will have reached the grove. Lilian didn’t mind though. Surprising your enemy is a valid tactic but not when you’re fighting public perception. The sisters were one thing, but Lilian would be fighting for her reputation as well today, Fenric’s followers would have to see that she was there to help them and sneaking up and knocking someone out didn’t exactly make you look like a hero.

Just then a question came to her. She motioned the words for biggest sister and weapon followed by the sign that indicated that she was asking a question. Emma looked confused at first but Lilian quickly realised that she was searching her memory for an answer. She mimed something long and thin with a large ball at the end of it. Lilian understood it to be some kind of mace. She thanked Emma very much, hugged her and told her to go home, she then promised to come and see her when she was finished. Emma’s face fell. Lilian suspected she was going to offer to help in the fight but one look at Lilian’s face and her serious expression put that idea right out of the little girl’s head. Instead, Emma rushed in for another hug before signing the words, “please, keep your promise.” Then, she turned on her heel and ran home.

Lilian and Fritha continued their journey into town. The snow had frozen in the night and so she had to watch her step as she made her way up the winding path to town. She could have cut across the slopes, but the snow was still deep and she had arranged to meet some friends in town. Seeing Benlunar rear up ahead of her as she wound her way up the hill brought back a nervousness that donning her armour had temporarily dampened. She knew deep down that they were just buildings, but they represented so much more than the wood they were made from. That corner was where she’d drunk blackberry fire for the first time. The house belonged to Kilde’s uncle who was known for teaching sheep how to do tricks. More memories appeared to her around every corner and even though some made her sad, she couldn’t help but smile at most. They were not just memories of buildings, but of kind and special people. That’s what today was about. Saving that spirit and allowing it to continue long into the future so that more people can experience it. Lilian was no fool, she understood that places changed, but what Sage Fenric wanted was not some evolution built in incrementally positive mutations. It was more like the burning of a field, an erasure that forced a complete reset. What came after might even be positive for some, but it would not be built on Benlunar’s foundations.

As she rounded a large drift of snow she caught sight of Serena and Peter waiting for her in the pre-arranged place. When they saw Lilian both of them smiled and came to meet her.

“My goodness!” said Serena, “you look incredible Lilian.”

Lilian smiled and looked down at her armour set, “Thank you. Hopefully it will protect me from the worst of it.”

“Naah,” replied Peter, “It’s all for show. They won’t even get close enough to hit you.” Lilian knew he was trying to comfort her and she smiled at the joke but it still felt a touch like gallows humour.

“I’ll be stationed on the path to town waiting for everyone,” said Serena. Lilian nodded and looked at Peter.

“And I’ll be at that fallen tree waiting to assist,” Lilian was about to say something else but Peter cut her off, “and yes I’ll listen out for your signal, if I don’t hear it, I’m gone.”

Lilian smiled and Serena put a hand on her arm, “It’s alright, we’re all ready and everyone knows what to do. You won’t be alone.”

Lilian hugged them both and was about to wish them luck when Peter suddenly remembered something, “Oh! Here, take this.” He reached into a bag and pulled out a water skin, handing it over to her. Lilian found that it was hot to the touch. “It’s a tea, made from the star flowers around the mountain. Ortan makes it and it’s good for calming the nerves. Only drink it if you feel you need to though.”

Lilian thanked him, hung the skin from the back of her belt and continued on her journey. She would only meet one final person on her way to the grove. As she left the stone streets lined with empty houses on the west side of town she found the dirt and gravel path that would take her to the grove. There, tired and lumbering back up to town was a large man followed by an old and tired dog. When he saw Lilian, Ortan the trapper waved and only spoke when he got close.

“It’s done,” he said.

“How did it go?” she asked, referring to the task they’d set for him the night before. He must have worked through the night to achieve it.

The trapper shrugged, “good I think.” He unpinned a small green rag from his bag strap and showed it to Lilian, “Look out for these, and yes they are all coated, Silky was very helpful. You’ve got two on the south side, right between the birches. Three west as instructed and two more around those thorn bushes on the south east slope. Now I bid you good luck, I am going for a shower, get this smell of deer off of me. I will be back soon, try not to start before hearing the robin whistle.”

“Thank you Ortan,” said Lilian, “and you don’t have to come back, you’ve done enough.”

Ortan looked at Lilian through bushy brows and somewhere in the thicket of unkempt beard Lilian thought she detected a smile, “You’ve come a long way from saving foxes Lausanne’s daughter. I will help where I can.” With that he walked past her and continued towards town. His dog, Silky, lolloped along with him and wagged her tail when Lilian held out her hand for her to sniff. The first stage of the plan had all been put in place. Now all that was left was to execute the rest. Lilian and Fritha restarted their journey towards the grove, there was no alternative, there was no turning back.

All Lilian could hear was the crunching of snow beneath her boot and the steady thump of her nervous heart. The grove was withered by winter, leafless trees stood on frozen earth with the corpses of rotten fruit strewn at their bases like once wonderful warriors. The bulk of Benlunar lived here now. Sodden tents and shanty huts were littered about the place. It was like safety or beauty were not welcome here, or rather like they were needed elsewhere. The few early risers that were gathered around campfires looked up as Lilian and Fritha approached them. The brilliance of her armour shone like an affront to the drab and dreary lives that had been made here. It produced scowls and whispers and the twisting of necks. Lilian heard the words heathen, non-believer and even heretic. She brushed them off like flecks of ash.

From out of the amalgam of makeshift homes Lilian caught sight of a familiar face. She knew she would have seen it sooner or later and she was glad that it appeared now.

“Hello Mum,” she said, just loud enough for her mother to hear her, but not so loud as to wake the remaining sleepers. Polly Lausanne stepped through and over the ropes and tarpaulin and approached Lilian with a scared expression. She looked at her daughter, at the clothes she was wearing, at the weapon on her back and she remembered the sweet, silly child she used to be and feared the warrior woman she had become.

“Lilian,” she nearly whispered the name, “What… what are you doing? I’ve told you already I don’t want you to cause trouble I…”

Lilian cut her off, there had been time for reason and that time was over, “I need you to listen to me. Things are about to get dangerous. I would ask you to bring as many people as you can back to town. Brother Thomas will have safe spaces for you all to go.”

Polly Lausanne looked at her daughter with shocked and incredulous eyes, “This is supposed to be a safe place for us.”

“Well it isn’t,” Lilian snapped, “Sage Fenric is planning to hurt you, he’s planning to destroy the town.”

Lilian’s mother threw her hands up in the air, “Lilian!” She exclaimed, “All we do here is talk, pray and paint murals and occasionally sing songs or cook food together it’s,”

“It’s a lie!” Lilian was raising her voice now, she reminded herself to keep calm but her temper was running away from her, “Fenric is evil, mum. He killed my friend and he’s using that mural you’ve all been working on to summon a demon. I’m here to stop him. So please, mum, please listen to me and leave this place while it’s still safe. Fenric won’t hesitate to harm you if it means getting to me. Please Mum.”

Lilian hoped that her honesty would get through this time. That her pleading would shake her mother into realising the truth. But she was met with that same, stony face. She’d done all she could bar physically removing her and so Lilian took a step towards the caravans at the far end of the grove.

“Lilian,” her mother called out and Lilian turned back to listen, “if you go there now. If you cause trouble and bring violence to this place. Then I don’t want you coming back to our house. I… I won’t wish to see you. I’ll want you gone from Benlunar, or else I will go. Either way we will not have a relationship. We’ll be as strangers.”

Lilian’s heart froze. Her stomach dropped and her head filled with fear. But her mind was made up. She looked at her mother and realised that she had already become something of a stranger. Certainly not the loving, caring and happy woman she’d left behind when she went to Freedos with Mr Attorcop. Lilian stared at her unblinking, “So be it,” she said and turned back to the caravans.

When she reached the colourful caravans, the only structures raised high off the ground, she was informed by an older man that Fenric was not there. He and the sisters had gone to inspect the mural early. Lilian thanked him and quickened her pace. If Fenric and the sisters were working on the mural themselves then it might be closer to completion than she’d thought.

Lilian picked her way through the worn pathway through the trees that surrounded the grove and followed the cliff wall round until she came to a second clearing. There were no trees here as the floor was mostly sheet rock that had been swept of snow and leaves. The space was large enough to fit the entire Fox and Octopus inn and maybe even its stables. Overlooking the area was a wall of stone that stretched high into the mountain. This was Benlunar’s north face and very few of the townsfolk ever bothered coming here. There was no chance of climbing it and nothing of interest or use could grow on the rock. Occasionally one might see a family of goats but the only thing adorning the cliff face today was a mural, two floors high and wide as the side of a building. Lilian looked up as she left the treeline. It depicted a green field and a blue sky. Dotted around the grass were colourful spring flowers and the sky was peppered with billowing, bright white clouds. Was this Fenric’s fables garden wondered Lilian. It was certainly beautiful, especially when compared to the grim winter skies above and the dead brown leaves and dirt under foot. In the middle of the field, a way off in the distance was a lone cow. Its head was raised and staring at the viewer, as if it had just been startled.

At the base of the cliff, surrounded by scattered buckets and brushes were four figures. Sage Fenric’s bright yellow cloak stood out from the cliff face like it was one of the flowers in the picture. His hood was up and he was walking towards Lilian to meet her. Just behind him, serious as a storm, were the sisters. Tourmaline was smiling, Hematite looked concerned and Spinel had that blank and curious expression on her face that always made Lilian feel uneasy. Like she was an antique pot being appraised for auction. Each of them wore the deep blue cloaks they had been wearing the day Lilian had first seen them in the Stave Church. It only occurred to her then that they were not just a uniform but they were effective battle wear. Try as she might, Lilian could not make out any weapons or armour they might have concealed beneath them.

The light clanking of Lilian’s armour echoed off the cliff wall as she stepped into the scene. Fenric held his arms out wide in greeting.

“Lilian,” he said, smiling his obsequious grin, “I’m so glad you came. My goodness, you look like a soldier. Surely we can resolve our differences without resorting to battle. Judging from our previous encounters I should think you would want the same thing.”

Lilian remained silent for a while. She focused on her breathing and tried to remain centred, she knew that Fenric would want to rile her up and she was not going to give him the satisfaction.

“Time’s up Fenric,” she called out, “I’ve given you every opportunity to leave. If you insist on staying then I shall be forced to remove you personally.”

Lilian's proclamation produced laughter from Fenric and Tourmaline, even Hematite’s face changed into a look of pity rather than concern. Spinel’s stare remained fixed and cold.

Once Fenric had stopped chuckling he stepped a few feet closer, “My dear child,” he said, “If you think a suit of armour and a stick are going to make me alter my plans then you’re even more naive than I thought.” His face grew suddenly serious, “I take it you remember our last encounter. We were lenient on you then, we will not be so forgiving this time around. Run along, Lilian Lausanne, we are busy.” He flicked his hand as if shooing away a clutch of chickens and then turned to go back to the mural.

Lilian took a deep breath. She had been able to stay calm until now but Fenric’s incessant infantilization was starting to take its toll. This meeting was never meant to be a long conversation and it appeared that talks were over. Lilian took a deep breath, reached down and touched Fritha’s neck and then started marching forwards.

Tourmaline matched Lilian’s pace and brushed past Sage Fenric as he retreated. Of course, thought Lilian, King Brava would send his army out first but his time would come eventually. Tourmaline sneered as she quickened her pace into a jog. Lilian reached behind her back for her tungsten switch and matched the bodyguard’s speed. The two would meet in the middle of the clearing. Tourmaline would not bring out her weapon until the last minute but if Lilian’s intelligence was correct then she would be ready for it. Out of the corner of her eye, Lilian caught sight of Hematite moving out and round to her right hand side. Spinel was harder to see but until Lilian caught sight of fur or jaws, she would pay the third sister no mind.

She and Tourmaline were running now, Fritha was keeping up beside Lilian, her coat darkening and her teeth growing longer and sharper with every step. When she was three steps away Tourmaline threw off her cloak and brought a heavy club out and round with her right hand. Lilian saw a ball of metal at the end of it with carefully crafted spikes welded into the mass. The attack was fast and had she not been prepared it would have caught her off guard and smashed into the side of her chest. But Lilian knew Tourmaline would be wielding a heavy weapon and so she ducked low and practically slid along the slippery stone floor. The club whooshed overhead and Lilian found herself directly beneath the eldest sister. She kicked up and out, catching her left leg with the sole of her foot. This, combined with the momentum of the club threw her off balance for just long enough for Lilian to stand and counter attack with her switch.

Time seemed to slow as the metal stick flicked through the air, its perfectly balanced handle sending the smaller tip hurtling ahead to connect with its target. In this case, Lilian was aiming for Tourmaline’s chin. She’d put her weight behind the attack, banking on Tourmaline having to focus on recovery after the kick. Any lesser fighter would have felt the cold steel impact their face like it was the shoe of a startled horse. But Tourmaline was no amateur. She threw herself off balance and out of the way, sacrificing sure footing to avoid injury. Lilian followed with another swipe and another, but both missed their mark by mere inches. Lilian did not judge her mistakes, or revel in her advantage. She remembered her lessons with Mr Attorcop and Mistress Eleyna and knew deep in her body that she was only as good as her next move.

Fritha joined the fight now, snapping at Tourmaline out from between Lilian’s legs, guarding her lower body from any incoming kicks. Together they closed in and punished Tourmaline for taking time to retreat in an attempt to gather herself. The tall woman, now clad in leather armour, a leather skirt and leg bracers, whipped nimbly out of the way of Lilian’s weapon. Heavy clubs were at a disadvantage when it came to speed but if their users could dodge for long enough then they only needed one hit to win a fight. Lilian was determined not to allow that hit to happen.

The sounds of clanking armour, weapon swipes, grunts and blocks echoed off the cliff face and into the morning air. Lilian had been preparing for this day for a long time and now it was finally here. She needed to breathe, to remember what she was fighting for and forget what defeat would cost her. But all the preparation in the world cannot save you from betrayal.