Lords of Chaos, chapter 1: Rulenka

In dreams, she was never Rulenka Magna, ordained by God, Hand to the King of the Sword, High Lady of the Morrowood, Duchess of Orendras, First Citizen of the Crownlands, Lady Protector of Oathkeep, Defender of the Faith, and Keeper of Sorrow's Heart.

In dreams, she was little Rula, a tender girl, alone in the world, as everything plunged into fire.

It was the same dream again, as ever it was. She was only six years old, and everything she'd ever known was her father's castle. Dwelling amidst the tranquil pines in the heart of the Morrowood, Sorrow's Heart was an ancient construction, built thousands of years past by the elves. Its core was a solitary tower, capped with an open rotunda, meant as a observatory. Stargazing was ever important to the Fair Folk, but doubly so for the faithful of Moroín, goddess of sorrow and loss, of compassion and healing, of memory...and death. Well, after a fashion; to the elves, there are two deaths: the passing of the body is a simple fact of life, even for the ageless, but the spirit and memory carry on in the Heartwood--at least if the elder trees aren't burned or hewn down. The death of an elder tree is the death of a tribe, of the collective consciousness of every one of its members past, of an entire thread of civilization. It is that last, true death which Moroín mourns, and nowhere more so than Min'tallath, the Morrowood, her namesake.

And the wood had certainly seen its share of sorrow and loss. Though much and more remained of the ancient forest once held sacred and inviolate by the elves, what had been lost to fire and the axe would never again return--not in the same way, at least. Even Rulenka could sense the ineffable presence of--something--in the ancient groves, amidst the trees as yet untouched by man. She always could--she'd just learned to stop admitting it, for fear of being called "touched", for fear of the Sisters.

Sisters had always been her world. Rulenka's father Rykos had been a good, loving, and strong man, but even so, he had been cursed with no sons to heir, only his three daughters, hellions and wildlings the lot of them. Or at least so he would say, when oft he would relent to their combined charm and spoil his little princesses, much to the dismay of his lady wife. Josseline Argard, neé Laurent, had oft as not been forced to pick up his slack, providing the blows and lessons that rightly he ought to have done. And yet, it was never enough. They were unstoppable, the three of them, with Annanka the eldest always leading the way, talking her young sisters into all sorts of mischief. Lyneska would balk, in the name of protecting her younger sister, but Rula relished the danger and excitement, and always pressured the more reserved middle sister into playing along.

There was the time Anna led them from the chantry, where they studied the Holy Word, to the men's training grounds. There, cousins Salkos and Norykos played at sword and lance with Ser Boryn Tanner, the master-at-arms. To teach them some sort of lesson, he'd had the boys stripped to the waist, their training armor discarded, as they whacked at each other with wooden sticks. Rula hadn't the slightest idea what her older sisters found interesting about that, but she'd given them plenty enough to worry about when she picked up a sword and started thwacking at a wooden post covered with straw. She didn't understand what all the fuss was about--it was a sword, not a live cobra, it wasn't like it would just stab her of its own accord--but writing the Parable of the White Stones fifty times in Auld Ascadian straightened her out.

She remembered the time Lyneska, of all people, took a fancy to the pretty singer from Saillonne, with his lute and his long, silvery hair. They were listening to his music in her room, when all of a sudden she'd heard father. Lyna ran outside to try to divert him while Rula snuck him out the window. She couldn't understand why he would be so reluctant to scale the stone wall--it wasn't as if she hadn't done it a hundred times. Slow as he was, they hadn't quite cleared the inner wall to hide out in the stables--her favorite hiding place--when her father's men came upon him and sent her back to her room. She didn't even get any supper, and it's not like she did anything wrong. Come to think of it, she never did hear from that singer again.

There were a hundred times, a hundred adventures, and hundred things to dwell on, to pour herself into, losing herself in sorrow and grief. She would scold herself each time, dismissing her folly to the gloom of the Winterwood, but oft as not uttering a quick prayer to Morrowyn to ease her suffering. And she would regain herself. And straighten her back. And go out and face them all, those faces, full of judgment, pregnant with expectation, waiting for her to fail, to show weakness, to give them any reason to doubt her. And why shouldn't they? Why should anyone listen to a silly little girl? What do girls know of rulership? Of wars, of rebellions, of crop shortfalls, of missing taxes, of unruly lords, and of courts full of men whose smiles wouldn't falter a lick as they slipped their silver daggers into your back?

She would steel herself. And then she would be Rulenka Magna, High Lady of the Morrowood, and all that higgedly-piggedly. And her woes could go and hide in the stables of her mind, and wait for.

And, when she slept, they would ambush her.

In dreams, there was no defense. In dreams, there were no titles to hide behind, no crown to armor herself. Just memories. And fire.

It all began with fire. It began, of all times, in the dead of winter, the sixth she'd known. Father and his court would winter in Orendon, so as not to inconvenience the never-ending stream of supplicants, well-wishers, and bootlickers (as he would call them). And for the first time, Rula would go with him. She was a big girl now, ready to face the world, to embark on a real adventure. She remembered every moment of the journey, as if some part of her were still there, and better for it. First, there was the Lady's Road--well, the Lord's road then, she supposed--the ancient elven path leading to the Burinflow. The elfroads are all of a kind--neither rock, nor packed earth, nor sand, yet they stayed clear, nothing more than low grass or moss growing from them. In summer, the rains would leave them near-dry while the forest floor was naught but mud, and in winter, the snows would pack hard and flat, and never ice over. Whatever sorcery made the elfroads, they would last well beyond the lives of men, without any apparent maintenance.

It was along that road she had ridden, with Father and Lyna and Anna, and father's men, and his horses, and a long train of wagons that made travel agonizingly slow, yet too constant to allow her to wander off, much as she'd have liked to. The Lord's Road was meant to connect the sites important to elves to one another, and to the river, and that it did. In the eaves of the Winterwood, she had seen forms of stone, ancient towers, ruins draped in vines and moss, long-abandoned holdfasts of the Fair Folk. She'd have gladly given over days to each in turn, to plumb its depths, to scale its walls, and to reach out with that--sense--of hers, in secret, to see if anything sensed back.

But, alas. She hadn't seen a one, even though Father had been so close to diverting to the Weeping Stones. It had only been a minor diversion, just across the river and up the hills, and the wagon had lost a wheel anyway, and...but it wasn't to be, not when Father's wizard had gotten to him, all full of rules and times and scowly faces. Father had promised they would visit on the return trip, when time was less pressing. But there would be no return trip. Not for him.

In waking hours, she would stay here, she would remember sneaking out of the camp by night, crossing the river (oh God, so cold), climbing the hills (oh that's why they call it razorvine), and finally infiltrating the old stone circle, the weeping tors where the elves would meet by night. She had quested forth for them then, feeling only a silent echo, a memory in a language she didn't know. But she had imagined them, gathering by darkest night, each with his candle, singing the ancient songs of Woe and Weal. Maybe afterward, they would dance, or sit around and paint each others' toenails. Hey, it was her daydream.

When it was a daydream.

When it wasn't, she would draw inexorably on, along the Burinflow, to sup with the Highsongs in their drafty castle, down the Silvershore, joining up with the Hillards and their annoying boy Myron--Lord Myron, Jarl of Evenfall Watch, her older self would remind her of her courtesies, even as she remembered the fat boy's cruel japes and his incessant need for attention. It would all speed by faster and faster, as if she was falling, accelerating toward her destiny.

She had spent a season and more in Orendon, and had adored every minute of it. Father gave her leave to travel under escort, which she would evade oft as not, to see Auld Oathkeep, to stand amidst history, not to mention amidst more people than she'd seen in all her years combined. She stood in the Court of the Oath, and could almost hear the voices of old, the emissaries of the Great Races in their high and lofty debates. In the Rotunda of Heroes, she could hear the roar of the soldiers assembled as the Army of Dawn formed up to do battle with dragons. In the Bastion of Sorrow, she had felt palpable awe, standing on the site where the world chose peace over war...at least, for a time.

But in dreams, it all blurred together, as the brightest and darkest memory of all loomed in her future. All road lead to Orendon, they say, and it seems once they arrive, they all lead to Oakenhall.

It seemed so much larger then. The castle of Kelekos, son of Eleka the First Lady, her most distant noble ancestors, had been built as a gift by the elves. Its walls were living wood, spelled into shape by ancient songs. Even when the Kurns burned it down, it had regrown, rising again from ruin. Though its walls were not as thick as those of the King's castle, the Palace of the Third Dynasty had not rebounded in the wake of the Kurns as Oakenhall had. Though the Argards had taken Sorrow's Heart as their seat, they needn't have lost faith--when Oakenhall renewed itself, the sign was plain, and thus began the long tradition of holding both seats in turn, each year.

A tradition she had kept herself. A tradition she had begun then. A tradition she would gladly cast to the wind if it could undo the past.

She had known something was strange. Sisters do. Anna was growing ever more reclusive, barely speaking to her on the journey south, staying in the camp whenever Rula would abscond. In Orendon, she poured into her studies, trying to make herself into Father's heir, the future High Lady of the Morrowood, and...never again just Anna, the big sister.

And for a time, that was all well and good. Orendon was more than it seemed Rula could explore in a lifetime, and the weeks slipped away like so many uncollected tax receipts (note to self: stop going to bed while reading the Steward's reports). And young as she was, she could scarce have been expected to understand the change in her sister. As if that stopped her from blaming herself. As if that could unmake fire and unburn flesh.

Rulenka had been away when it happened, and to that, she owed her life. In years to come, she'd managed to piece together an understanding. Annanka and Father were fighting, as the serving folk could plainly tell. Some say she was rejecting a marriage proposal, others say she had decided to become a nun, and he was wroth. In any case, the fight seemed to have awakened something...awful. Evil, some would say, but never dare so in her presence. She refused to consider it so, no matter what the smallfolk might believe, no matter what the silent stares of the Sisters suggested. Evil it may not have been, but Fire it was, in its purest, hottest form. And when she began, she couldn't stop.

Anna had burned Oakenhall, a fire hotter than anything since the Kurns put it to the torch. And while the castle didn't burn to the ground as once it had, it had spread very quickly, overtaking High Hall, where the lord's family dwelt.

Of the three dozen servants, guards, and attendants, only three survived, and they did not live well. Of Father, there was...only charred bone. And Anna...

She was at the fire's center. Unburnt. Clad only in ash and embers. Shaken. Broken. Unable to comprehend. Muttering to herself in a language she shared only with God.

The Sisters came. Fire was theirs, as ever, and they knew best how to tend to the wounded few. There were cries of fury from lords who had lost sons and daughters who'd served as servants. There was a great tumult from the commons, who decried a witch, and cursed the family name. But the Sisters had none of it. She was theirs to judge, and theirs alone, for her gift was the True Flame.

Rulenka had read everything there was to read about the True Flame, about the Sisterhood of St. Devorah, and about her ancestors, rumored to have brought the gift to the west even before the Prophet's arrival in Tellandor. Her libraries in Oakenhall and Sorrow's Heart held hundreds of books and scrolls--some written by monks, some by wizards and other neutral observers, some by the Church's enemies, among them apostates who meant to lay bare the Church's darkest secrets. She had devoured it all. And she'd learned nothing that helped her understand.

She'd learned that the True Flame almost never manifests at such an advanced age. Where most magicks flower at the budding of adulthood, more or less, the Gift comes early, and has even been manifest by babes-in-arms. The Sisters claim it is meant to be that way, for only a child's mind can learn to master the Gift without succumbing to its many temptations. One need only read of Arda the Unworthy, or Maella the Proud, or Zyressa, the Blood-Witch of Ebon Isle...history is littered with examples of women who took the Gift too far, past any semblance of divine purpose, twisting it to their dark ends. The Sisterhood maintains that, in such cases, the Gift fades, and is replaced by the Flame of the Adversary. Hellfire can seem like the True Flame to laymen, but worry not--the Sisters know the difference. As if that made it better.

As if that could unburn flesh.

She had forgiven her sister. She had to. She was guided through the words by her lady mother when she returned to Sorrow's Heart, where she wouldn't leave for another ten years. And yet, those years brought wisdom, and learning, and another ten brought doubt. Had she forgiven her? Can a child of six years even comprehend the enormity of what her elder sister had done, or what it means to forgive? Can a child be expected to rise above human frailty, to think of family and the realm before all, and to find solace in faith and prayer?

That's what Lyna had done. Rula had been furious, in the manner only a girl a few summers before her flowering can be. Lyna was all she had left--well, there was Mother, but she was cold, and distant, and lost without Father. Her remaining sister had become all the more withdrawn and reserved, never making time for Rula, leaving her to suffer without comfort or understanding.

And of all things, Lyna wanted to be a Septa? She might have taken up with Kurns, or become a Magelord's consort, and it would have been less wounding. The Church was God's house, and God was the one who took the family away. And she just...gave herself to him. Toiling away her days in prayer and simple work. As if that were good for anything. At least Anna was out throwing fireballs at evil monsters, or whatever the Sisters do. It wasn't as if she'd ever written, or visited. It wasn't as if she cared.

But those were a child's thoughts.

The dreams could torment her, and memories could hound her waking days, but she was a woman grown now. Almost two score years had smoothed over the wounds of the past. She had become what she must become. The last heir of Rykos Argard, of her ancestors Eleka Sweetfire and Kelekos First-Lord, ordained by God, Hand to the King of the Sword, High Lady of the Morrowood, Duchess of Orendras, First Citizen of the Crownlands, Lady Protector of Oathkeep, Defender of the Faith, and Keeper of Sorrow's Heart.

She was Rulenka Magna.

She was strong. And terrified. And wise. And vulnerable. And alone.

Even as she stepped into her court, to hundreds of faces beaming with false joy and real desire, a den of wolves wearing sable and ermine, and none more wolfish than the Potentate's men.

She defended the realm. She defended it from greed, and corruption, and faithlessness, and chaos. She stood guard, while the other High Lords sat about, forgetting their vows, minding their own gardens.

As if that would save them.

She stood tall in Oakenheart, the Regrown Castle, in the heart of Orendon, once Auld Oathkeep, city of Peace, capital of Civilization. And beset on all sides by war, and ruin, and the loss of something truly special, and irreplaceable.

Should it fall, it would be the end not just of a city, or of a people, but of a collective spirit and consciousness, an idea that dared to challenge the old ways, that dared to imagine peace. Should it die, it would not be reborn. Though men might flee to the east, though others might build atop Oathkeep's ruin, its dream would be forever dead.

And the Morrowood would remember. And the goddess would weep at what was lost.

If Rulenka should fail.