A Place South of Paradise

By John Douglas Gwyn

Robi and Adan are boys from different lands.

Thousands of years ago the words that told men the way were blazed into the rock. In Robi's land, isolated by towering mountains, the words have long been the way. It is a place of tranquillity where science and the arts flourish and war is just a distant memory.

In Adan's land, the Salacian horde has swarmed from the black plains close to the Mountains of Madness and swept across the country bringing fear and death to all who would choose to live by the words. In a desperate attempt to slow the enemy's advance, Colonel Astara, Adan's father, stays to fight as Adan and his mother flee. They are separated when Adan, with the best of intentions, disobeys his mother's instructions.

A combination of events throws Robi and Adan together in Adan's world. They encounter an old friend in an unexpected guise and confront many perils as they search for Adan's parents.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Oct 9, 2017
• ISBN: 9781925666168

John Douglas Gwyn

If you're looking for a bright, young, highly polished author then I'm afraid we are all out of luck. I am old, irritable and relatively ugly. I've lived most of my life in the bush and I've tried my hand at many different things over the years. Perhaps the most enjoyable, although for me, not very rewarding in the financial sense, was opal mining around Lightning Ridge, in northern New South Wales. As a young man I'd always enjoyed an entertaining story and in my less lucid moments I'd even contemplated trying to write one. It was many years later, with a little more time on my hands, before I finally made the effort. My first story, although read by a relatively small number of people, attracted enough favourable comment to encourage a second. I write primarily to entertain but even a small contribution towards paying the bills would be a much appreciated bonus.

Book preview

Part 1

Although his mother Lincel had sent him to bed early, Adan had slept little during the night. The sounds of battle, terrifying and moving menacingly ever closer ensured that he snatched only fleeting moments of sleep. He was however, sleeping when loud banging on the front door brought him suddenly and fearfully awake. He heard movement and a match flare as his mother lit the lantern. The door creaked and voices reached him. He couldn’t decipher the words but he could measure the urgency in them. He wished desperately that the tall, dark haired man with the ever ready smile was with them but Adan’s father, like many other good men in the beleaguered city of Paraquae had joined General Caraco in a desperate, if almost certainly futile, attempt to hold back the Salacian hordes.

Despite her best efforts, Adan could easily read fear in his mother’s eyes as she hurried into his tiny room. A candle flickered fitfully in a jar that she carried. She saw instantly that he was awake. Hurry Adan. We must leave. The enemy has broken through our lines. They are already in the city.

Lincel had known in her heart that this time would come. Much as she dreaded leaving her beloved Ador, for the sake of their son she had considered fleeing the city much earlier. Others had tried, even before the peace talks had inevitably failed. Many had been killed; many others had been driven back into the city. The peace talks had never been more than a ploy to allow the Salacians to surround Paraquae unopposed.

Their bag had long been packed. The night was cold. Lincel helped Adan into his coat and seconds later they were part of a small fearful group on the street that hurried towards the underground.

General Caraco had advised the ordinary people of the city to stay in the shelters they had prepared earlier, when the Salacians entered the city. They would become second-class citizens but if sufficiently servile, most at least, would survive. Almost all of the people, now moving towards the centre of the city, knew they would be targeted by the Salacians for execution or brutal enslavement. They were prominent people or the families of prominent people, who had spoken against the enemy. Lincel had even more to fear than most. Her husband had served with General Caraco’s resistance force from the very beginning. She was losing the battle to stifle tears as she thought how things had changed so terribly in a few short years.

The Salacians had first come to power in the small city of Salace, on the Black plains, near the foothills of the Mountains of Madness. They claimed to worship Ilidia the god of all good Ilidasians. At first, they preached tolerance and charity but as their power and influence spread, their demeanour subtly changed. They began to slyly fuel any simmering difference among the people of the lowlands. They encouraged discord, resentment, intrigue and corruption. They moved from tolerant to intolerant, from intolerant to vile. The evil, the greedy, the cruel and the weak rushed to serve them. Eventually existing authority had crumbled across almost all of the lands of Ilidasia. The lands had become chaos and evil, in the form of the Salacians, had found chaos to be a land of limitless opportunity. In ten short years their evil empire had spread six thousand miles from Salace at the foot of the Mountains of Madness to Paraquae at the foot of the Mountains of Mystery.

Her misery was not the sole cause of Lincel’s tears. Shells from the enemy’s great cannons had caused many fires to rage. Thick acrid smoke hung heavy in the air. A shimmering miasma of poisonous smog swirled around the few gaslights that still showed the way. Lincel thought, almost like some evil ethereal thing, dancing on the grave of the city she loved.

A fit of coughing raked Adan as she dragged him past a woman struggling to control four small unruly children. Lincel had promised her husband to place Adan above all else when this time came, even so she could not help feeling ashamed at ignoring her basic instincts. A few seconds later a shell landed, not far behind, knocking her and all those around to the ground. As she anxiously pulled an unharmed Adan to his feet, a long, piteous wail rose chillingly and heartbreakingly from the street behind her. Lincel made no effort to stem the tears that streamed down her cheeks, dragging Adan behind her she ran for the underground entrance that loomed in front of her. She hated the Salacians with every ounce of her being.

The trains, imported from Anglosia, once the pride of the county, had long since exhausted their fuel. The tunnel under the city now served only as a shelter from the enemy’s cannons.

All those who entered were asked to identify themselves. The young Captain that stopped Lincel seemed more intent on studying the haunting beauty of her face than the card she proffered. Eventually he lowered his eyes to the card. He ordered a subordinate to fetch Colonel Ador Astara’s file. The man was gone only seconds; he returned carrying a slim portfolio. The captain studied the contents briefly before asking Lincel a number of questions. Many were of a personal nature. She didn’t mind. Like some foul invasive vapour, Salacian spies and stooges had managed to permeate almost every nook and cranny of society. Only Ador could have provided those questions and other than herself, only Ador could have answered them truly.

The Captain handed the file, back to his subordinate, before quietly apologising. I’m sorry that I may have embarrassed you. Please forgive me. These are terrible times.

Lincel smiled. They are indeed Captain. I do understand.

He pointed, Continue down the tunnel, others are waiting. God be with you both. There was warmth in his smile but it couldn’t mask the tiredness and fear that lurked in his eyes.

Before turning away Lincel said softly, And may God be with you.

She and Adan joined a group that swelled to perhaps two hundred people before one of the soldiers pulled a lever beside the track. To the astonishment of most, a section of the wall slid back revealing the entrance to another tunnel.

A silver haired officer held up his hand to silence the murmuring crowd before speaking. This tunnel will take us beyond the enemy’s front line and our scouts report that many of the forces that have been roaming the hill above the city have moved down close to the battlefront. He didn’t speak his thoughts, no doubt anxious to share in the rape and plunder soon to come. Some of our own forces are waiting in the hills. They will do what they can to assist but our journey will still be perilous. The Anglosi have ships standing off the small port of Corsa about fifteen miles to the south-west. They will evacuate all who reach the town tonight.

The echo of a hard ridden horse’s hoofs clattered in the close confines of the tunnel. Seconds later a dusty rider reigned in his sweating mount and passed a note to the officer. He scanned it briefly before nodding to the horseman. The rider saluted, turned his mount and rode off, again at reckless speed. There was also urgency in the officer’s voice. I have just received word that General Caraco is ready to draw as many of the enemy away from our sector as possible. We must leave immediately and we must share the burden. We will all take turns at carrying small children and helping the elderly. We will carry nothing we do not need.

As Lincel filed into the tunnel, a soldier gestured to her bag. You take no treasure?

She responded softly, Only the one that walks beside me.

Part 2

A tired General Esto Caraco lay back in the canvas chair. He hadn’t slept properly for many days but that didn’t matter now; he expected that his next sleep would be eternal. As he waited, his thoughts wandered back to a time in his youth; a time when he was eleven and his father had lain ill with a fever for many days. Even in the lower mountains it had been a cruel winter and with his bedridden father unable to hunt, food had been desperately short. One morning, young Esto had quietly taken his father’s rifle and set out to hunt, determined to provide his father and the rest of his family with something sustaining to eat. About a mile from home, Esto came across the tracks of a small flock of mountain sheep. He tracked them higher into the mountains, oblivious of time and unheeding of direction. In the early afternoon, wind blown snow had started streaming across the slope quickly obliterating the tracks Esto had been so keenly following.

Suddenly realising that he was lost. He decided to climb higher praying that the fickle weather of the mountains would clear at least long enough for him to see his way home. The shrill call of the Snow Eagle heralded the easing of the wind. Shortly after, the snow stopped and a pale watery sun, now worryingly low, showed again, but Esto was still lost. Bordering on panic, and fighting back tears, he decided to fire the rifle in the faint hope that it might attract attention or at least that another hunter might hear and respond in kind, giving him a guide to the way home. As Esto lifted the weapon, he saw three men watching him from a ridge about fifty yards above. Even greater fear surged through Esto. He knew instantly from their garb and weaponry that they were Gael.

Almost before he’d left the cradle, he’d heard stories about these formidable warrior people who, it was said, would tolerate no intrusion into their domain. To Esto’s relief and astonishment it was not a weapon but an arm that was raised by the man in the middle. He pointed off down the valley. Esto’s eyes followed the way he pointed and after a time he saw a thin grey plume of smoke rising like a beautiful beacon, showing the way home. As he turned, what he had thought was a patch of snow resting on bare rock, suddenly seemed to swirl round and drift uphill. Fear gave speed to his flight. He knew he had seen the wolves and he knew that the Gael had saved his life twice that afternoon.

He killed a hare close to home, a lucky shot considering the poor light. It made a nourishing stew and no doubt aided his father’s recovery; even so his welcome home hadn’t been unequivocally warm.

Already intrigued by stories he’d been told, the experience had further strengthened young Esto’s interest. He’d become a keen student of the Gael. It is often said and with some truth, that the victor writes the history but the history, or at least the history available to Esto, had invariably been written by the vanquished.

Around a thousand years ago, a string of oppressive regimes in the great land of Bruin had caused the Gael to seek sanctuary in the mountains that now bore their name. Always a resourceful people they had adapted brilliantly to the harsh land of their exile. Over the centuries, armies, drawn by stories of the vast wealth of the Gael, had marched into the mountains, their heart set on plunder. None had prospered. For many the mountains had offered only misery and death.

That many others did survive was largely due to a strange custom of the Gael. For them it is not considered honourable to harass either an individual or an army that has conceded defeat. When the shattered remnants of those once proud armies turned for home, the Gael lowered their weapons and allowed them to leave unmolested, or at least unmolested by the Gael themselves. General Esto Caraco knew that it would never happen but given the opportunity he would not follow the Gael’s example, given the opportunity he would harass the Salacians all the way to hell.

Uno stood and was climbing from the bunker before either the General or Colonel Astara had even heard the rider’s approach. Uno had come to the General long ago warning of the horror to come. At the time the General had not truly believed. He wished now that he had, even so he doubted that he could have stopped it. The General smiled grimly as he pushed himself upright. He thought Uno was a remarkable man; if man he was, remarkable still if man he was not.

Uno did not speak when he re-entered the bunker. He simply gave the General a small nod, his face devoid of expression. There were over fifty men in the bunker, all had family or friends in the tunnel on the other side of the city and all were more than willing to die if it would help them escape. The attention of every man there was now focused on the General. He looked past Uno and the Colonel to the assembled men. He said sombrely, I truly regret that I have led you to this day, but mere, fallible, mortal that I am, I have done my very best.

Colonel Astara interrupted, We are honoured that you have led us. This day would have come much sooner had you not. If only others had joined us earlier -.

It was the General’s turn to interrupt. Do not be too hard on others my friend. It has always been the way of the Salacians to murder the families of those that have opposed them. Many a man would gladly risk his own life but very few will risk the lives of those they love. His gravely voice softened, You all know, perhaps even better than I, what incredible courage that takes, and of course so does our enemy. Were we ten times as many we would still only have delayed this day but it is here now and if we must die we will at least give the Salacians cause to remember us.

The Gael used caves, tunnels and great exploding mines. They had the privilege of choosing the most advantageous ground to engage their enemies. The General would also use tunnels and exploding mines. He didn’t choose the place of battle but he knew well the lay of the land and the tactics of his enemy. About a mile from the southern wall of the city of Paraquae, a shallow depression rolled from east to west. It provided excellent shelter for the big guns that pounded the city and it was the logical place to store reserve ordinance and troops.

The General led his men into the narrow tunnel. He was aware this last savage act of defiance would not seriously cripple the Salacians. He hoped it would draw some of the enemy’s strength from the flanks, giving many of his men a better chance of escape. Most of all, he hoped the enemy would push hard into the now, virtually defenceless city and away from the citizens fleeing for Corsa. Once past the city wall, there was no ventilation; the air quickly became warm and fetid. The General was breathing heavily and sweating profusely by the time he reached the small reinforced room at the tunnel’s end.

His discomfort couldn’t contain the wolfish gleam that burned in his eyes as he used the candle he carried to light over a dozen fuses that protruded from the walls. The fuses, protected from the elements by canvas and grease, had been secretly laid many weeks earlier. They led to large sealed pits of explosives. Huge quantities of shrapnel had been placed around the mines before the earth, and finally the turf, had been carefully replaced. The burning fuses were quickly turning the air toxic. The General coughed as he pointed to a ladder lying along the wall, Get back and take that with you. He then lit the sole remaining fuse. It led to a small charge in the ceiling that would blow a hole and allow desperately needed fresh air to flow into the tunnel. When the mines had done their work the General and his men could go about their bloody business. Ears protested the explosion but lungs relished the cold fresh air that immediately followed.

Rifles covered the hole as the ladder was erected. Shouting came from above. The General looked at his watch. A devilish grin split his face as he placed his hands over his ears. The earth shook with each massive explosion. Loose soil fell from the hole above, more trickled through gaps in the reinforcing. Flashes from the explosions showed expressions strangely close to ecstasy. The men who wore them knew that death was, at best, only minutes away. Even before the reverberations from the last explosion had died the General was charging up the ladder.

The scene that greeted him and his men was one of utter and glorious devastation. Great weapons of war lay in smashed disarray; many fires burned, dead and injured were everywhere. A detachment of confused Salacians were charging down the slope. The grin came again as the General lifted his rifle, Let’s send more of these pigs straight to hell. Rifle fire slowed the Salacians’ advance. Many fell before they realised fully what was happening. The General’s men were among them. When ammunition failed, swords were drawn and wielded with savage efficiency.

Stunned by the ferocity of the attack, surviving Salacians retreated in panic. Gunners above, showing the kind of compassion for which Salacians were renowned, opened fire. Their own men bore the brunt of the first volley but soon many of the General’s men also fell. He charged up the slope, hurling grenades and obscenities with equal vigour barely noticing the bullets that thudded into his body. His grenades, and others, found their mark. Then, he and his few remaining men were again engaged in a frenzy of slashing and hacking. Terrified Salacians fled and the General’s men pursued them, killing until they too were killed.

Colonel Astara, already on the ground, his left leg smashed by a savagely swinging rifle butt, saw the General go down. Ignoring his own agony, he crawled towards him. The General heard him coming and turned. He managed a smile and whispered, It’s been a fine night’s work Colonel, such a shame that it must end now, I was really enjoying myself. Blood coughed from the General’s mouth and his eyes closed.

The Colonel whispered, Travel well my General, as he reached for his bandoleer. He might yet kill a few more Salacians.

He was astonished when Uno’s voice came, Can you walk Colonel?

He looked up. Although covered in blood and worse, Uno appeared unscathed. As he knelt beside the General, Colonel Astara said, I have a broken leg Uno and I fear the General has gone.

Uno, his hand on the General’s chest said suddenly, No! He still lives but only just. We must hurry.

The General was a big man, Uno was not. The Colonel was amazed at how easily the body was lifted. With the General cradled in his arms, Uno bent beside the Colonel and instructed, Place your arm around my neck. The Colonel gritted his teeth in agony as he was literally dragged to the tunnel entrance. Uno