My Lord Aquith directs me to place these words on paper.
He insists that I identify myself as the scribe. Men call
me Piplerian Q'Norcail Veni. My Lord Aquith laughs as he
rolls my name about his tongue.
"They gave you enough names to rule a country."
I was found forty-four years ago in a field. I came into
this world deformed so my parents abandoned me. This wasn't
cruelty but a chance to give the gods an opportunity to
correct their error. They chose to do so by having Lord
Aquith, the elder, my Lord Aquith's father, pass judgement
that I should live. He gave me to the women of the Keep to
use according to their needs and my poor talents.
Each of the eleven women offered the gods a name for me.
Denir, the priest, accepted each name and gave them a form he
called, "logical."
Wise Denir saw my eyes and pronounced me fit for
education as a scribe. Denir had a wisdom that spoke of the
elder gods although he wore the cloth of the usurper from the
East, the one Patrick brought, the God of Death, the one they
call, Savior Christ.
I fear this god. He has ambition. He states that other
gods are false. I state no god is false who makes himself
felt. Denir would have understood. With a grin, he adopted
the cloth of the new god and let the water be splashed on his
face.
"Patrick," Denir once told me, "had men with heavy swords
at my baptism. I didn't want to be called to the bosom of
this new god on that day so I made do with his blessing
instead."
"But baptism is powerful," I protested.
"And I am a good Christian, Pip. I didn't take his holy
water with a closed heart. Still, an ocean could not wash
from me the ways of my fathers. I still carry the verse of
law and the stories of old. The old gods have not left me.
Christ will simply have to share me with them.
He laughed shamelessly.
Denir was old when I was young. He said he would face
this Christ and mediate his quarrel with the elder gods in
the next world. Denir's had no success as yet, if I may judge
from the humorless monks who replaced him. They have not the
poetry or humor of the Druid, nor his learning of the law.
They act without precedent, relying on unknown spirits rather
than the law.
Men no longer know how to behave.
These monks have only scribbling, something, if I serve
as an example, any idiot may learn.
I bless my Lord Aquith that these pages will be secret
and I can say my piece without fear of these dark monks.
These men of small learning despise me as I know their craft
without sharing their loyalties. I serve the elder gods in
secret. When they splashed the holy water on me, I was in
this world but a few days and so the baptism was less
powerful and did not hold my soul.
They know but cannot kill me. My Lord Aquith protects me.
Still, the purpose of these pages is not served by my
ramblings of the past. It is the events of recent days that
must be set down. I place my first lines only because my Lord
Aquith thinks they will help those who are to come to under-
stand. He has faith that these pages will be found in an
age when we are both dust.
"Even the walls have their lifetimes. There'll be a time
when these stones are removed and the iron chest will once
again come before the eyes of men.
"What sort of men will find it?"
"You're curious for a scribe, Pip. I venture they'll be
much like us."
"Wiser?"
"I fear not. Cleverer, perhaps, with better tools. But
not wiser."
I could see he was having private thoughts as he said it.
He broods at times. I can't presume to understand the
meanderings of my betters. He gives me much freedom in the
strokes of this quill. He knows I understand the limits of
his tolerance."
My Lord Aquith was presiding over the festival of the
fall. It has always been a time of joy. For the space of a
few days, the drudgery of summer is replaced by mild weather
and there is time for contemplation.
The poets are at their best just before the first snows
and will recite for long hours before the fires of cool eves.
Children born in this season are strong.
If they are boys and survive the winter at their weakest,
they become the good right arm of my Lord Aquith. The common
soldiers are always chosen from this stock.
If they are girls, they will bear many children.
It's a good time under the rule of the elder gods. I
don't know what this Christ will bring. No comforting
thoughts, I fear.
The festival was lit by seven huge fires set in the
ancient pattern. They lit the spirited dancing of the young.
If the old gods looked on all this with mirth, the sexless
monks from the East viewed the dancing with fierce and
unforgiving glares. But for the will of my Lord Aquith, this
ritual would be forbidden.
I saw the future Lord Aquith standing among the monks,
his hair unnaturally cut with continence as stony as theirs.
May the gods preserve!
The child, who has barely seen six summers, seemed so
joyful at birth. Now he is Christ's. Does a dark generation
cloud this Keep?
They say Christ walked the Earth in the guise of man.
Could he have been like his followers? I wonder if his judges
were not correct in their judgement. My Lord Aquith once
executed a man who was leading his followers in a pattern of
worship my Lord Aquith thought too rigid. I asked him why.
Did not this man honestly worship the old gods? Surely the
complaints of worthless monks was not reason enough to
execute a man?
