Chapter 2: Volume 1 - CH 1.2

“Tomorrow’s the big day. Your nerves must be frayed, Brother!” said Felicia, in the midst of our family supper.

“Not yet they are, thank you. After all, I can’t do aught but let the chips fall where they may,” I responded.

Upon the fifth month of his fifteenth birthyear, the ordinary Londosian attends a particular ceremony officiated by the church. Such is tradition in this kingdom of Londosius, and most do partake in it, for none are turned away on account of status.

The ‘Roun of Orisons,’ as it is called—a rite from which one attains ‘odyl,’ or the spring and store from which magicks are drawn. A priest presides over its proceedings, during which, it is said, one would commune with the Deiva, Yoná. Thereupon, one’s soul would be bound to Her, and through this bond, She would share her grace: the gift of odyl.

How much is shared differs between each person, and to be given a generous amount all but guarantees success in one’s future endeavours. Little wonder as to why so many find themselves gripped with anxiety on the eve of this ceremony.

“I, for one, have little doubt that our very own Rolf will be blessed with a veritable mountain of odyl,” my mother boasted. “A great service he’ll do for the Order! Won’t you, Rolf?”

“Now hear, my love. It won’t do for our boy to sooner buckle under a mountain of expectations, now would it!” my father quipped. “Already, he is prodigious in matters of book and blade both. Nevermind a mountain—just a mound will do, and he’ll flourish just the same.”

My parents’ faces were fast abeam as they showered their praises upon me.

“Listen well, Rolf,” said my father, turning to me. “No doubt the generosity of Yoná’s gift will prove crucial, but do not be so taken by it. Of greatest account is that through the Roun of Orisons, you commune with Yoná Herself, and thereby with Her, birthing a new bond. Keep this in your heart!”

“Of course, Lord Father,” I answered.

“Hm, very good. And while you’re at it, why not brush up on the Rounic scriptures?” my father continued. “You’re well-read in them, I know, but oft is there something to be gleaned from re-treading a trodden path, especially that of a saint’s.”

“That I will,” heeded I my father’s counsel. And once supper was done with, I dutifully headed over to the manor study.

♰

Six centuries past, there lived a saint by the name of Rakliammelech. From the empyrean on high, he received the Revelation, and thereupon was enlightened of the Roun—a miracle most hallowed, the workings of godly hands and godly thought. Through it could the souls of Man be bound to Yoná, and by Her grace attain the gift of odyl.

A story known to any and all in this kingdom, recounted in the book I now took to hand. Scriptures telling of the lore of the Roun of Orisons—in the corner of the study, I opened its familiar pages, and, by my father’s earlier insistence, committed myself to reading through the familiar tale.

♰

Rakliammelech was then a youth in his prime, and most compassionate. He cared for his mother—frail-legged, she was—and together they lived in a settlement nestled within the vales.

Once upon a time, under the light of the noon sun, young Rakliammelech was busy afore his home, tending to his field. It was at that moment that into the settlement, they came—the ‘Nafilim’.

His mother, weak of legs as she was, could hardly suffer a hasty flight, and so Rakliammelech, gripped with desperation, took hoe in hand and went to scatter the invading Nafilim. Try as he might, however, the young man’s bark was worse than his bite. No sooner was he skewered with spears and left to prostrate whence he once stood.

Hours wound by. Rakliammelech lifted the lids over his eyes. By some miracle was his life spared—but as he would come to know, it was a miracle ill-shared. Before him was his mother, hewn to pieces, her human shape far forgotten.

A death of unspeakable cruelty, handed down to the only blood relation he had on this earth—the very sight of it sent the son into a howling fit of despair. His wounds unwound themselves, basting his body in blood with whom he no longer shared.

From then on, poor Rakliammelech committed much of his days to prayer. He tended to the fields, but only to reap the least of what would sustain him. Any other hour found him beside a great tree, praying to the gods.

In those olden days, Yoná was not worshipped as the sole deity, for throughout the lands, men practised each their own native faiths. For his part, Rakliammelech was ill-apprised of the gods, and knew neither to whom he should pray nor how. Nonetheless, he could not bear the thought of leaving his mother’s soul to linger on unsoothed.

Was she given to this ‘heaven,’ as they called it? Or did her destination lie elsewhere? The answers were lost to Rakliammelech, but what wasn’t was his desire to bring about a peace where none would have further need to suffer.

And he could no longer deny the great yearning for grace with which to smite the Nafilim and undo their coil of misery. For they were Unreason itself, with lightning immediacy trampling those who aspired to little more than living their lives in harmony. The meek must resist, and do so without fail—of how, he wished to know.

So it was that day by day, Rakliammelech persevered in his prayers beside that great tree, the most magnificent of all the trees he knew and within which he envisioned a godly presence. ‘Better to rise up in arms than wallow in prayer,’ rebutted none, for in their despair against the terrible might of the Nafilim, men had made cowards of themselves. What was left to Rakliammelech, then, was nothing but prayer.

Through days of snow swollen high, he prayed. Through days of screaming storms, he prayed. Through days of seething heat, he prayed—on and on, unmoving and unbending, prayers bereft of their erstwhile serenity.

Scarcer numbered the days that found him upon the field. Prayer became his life, consuming him for days on end, during which he eschewed all sleep and sustenance. His figure paid the toll, now too frightful to be rightfully that of a saint’s, it was said.

♰

Having read up to that point, I pried my eyes away from the text on a whim, finding Felicia coming into the study.

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“There you are!” she called.

“Found me, I see. Here am I to indulge in the scriptures again, just as Father bade me do.”

“And I bid you retire soon for the night, dear Brother,” she said. “You have such an important day tomorrow, yet I was worried you might still be cooped up in the study, as you are like to do for hours on end.”

“You’re very kind, Felicia. Thank you,” I returned. “And good night.”

“Oh… Yes. Good night, dear Brother,” she said, taking leave of the study. It would seem Felicia wished to chat a while more, and if so, I’ve done her a disservice. But it was in believing it would not do to interrupt her brother’s literary duties that she left with such immediacy.

Warmed by my sister’s thoughtfulness, I turned my eyes back to the book.

♰

And then one day, at long last, came the Revelation. In the recesses of Rakliammelech’s mind, there spoke a voice, intermittent, but infinitely warm and profound.

“…cheth… thi…

Hail, dost my voice reacheth thine ears?”

Right away, the young man sensed it to be the words of the divine. He knew not why, only, his conviction had convinced him so.

“O son of Man, by thy Mercy

so gaol’d in durance of Prayer.

Lo, by my god-some name, Yoná,

this Roun, veil’d myst, thou art receipt.”

Rakliammelech then felt an unknowable flow coursing into him, and in that moment, there took form within him knowledge by which to link one’s soul to the Deiva Herself: the ‘Roun’, as She so called it.

“To thine own kin, pray bequeathest this Roun…

To the Wicked, dread-lorn… barest thy Fangs…”

The voice then began to wane.

“O son of Man… pray, by Strength of thy kin,

redeemest the World… of Ages Pass’d…”

Quietude returned.

At the foot of the great tree, Rakliammelech slowly rose. He felt then how alike the divine voice was to his late mother’s own.

From then on, the saint, enlightened as he was, wandered the various lands, conferring the Roun to his fellow man. Through it, the folk employed magicks to protect both their homes and their own lives.

Rakliammelech was shown deep gratitude, indeed, and was even offered coin and titles, but abstinently did he refuse them all. By his words, thanks should be given to Yoná, for he was merely Her messenger and mediator.

The saint eventually came into Death’s embrace, and thereafter those who loved both him and the Deiva founded the Yonaic faith. Knowledge of the Roun, itself the rites by which to commune with Yoná, was preserved in earnest, and the nascent Yonaic priesthood devoted itself to conferring it to the kin of Man. It was then that these rites came to be known as the Roun of Orisons.

The priesthood, on account of the burden borne of having one’s soul bound to a god, also ruled that the Roun of Orisons be carried out for those at least fifteen years of age. So it was that the priests continued to confer it to the kin of Man all throughout the lands, granting them strength.

In time, resistance against the Nafilim came to be institutionalised. Cities were built. Realms were born. Of note was Rakliammelech’s own homeland, whereupon the foundations of the kingdom of Londosius were laid. What grew from it would become the grandest of all the realms of Man.

And so, as they say, the rest was history.

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