Hyrde

By David Lawrence

Hyrde had been forced to grow up fast. Agyran raiders had seen to that. The family home and close-knit community that she’d known are far behind her. There has been no place to lay her head since.

Not that she hasn’t tried to get off the tracks and byways, to exchange the hedgerows for a bed, and her worn blanket and dry leaves for clean cotton sheets. But the Everlight has gifted her, and called her to aid a hunted people: the Arfolc. Her days and nights are given over to the all-consuming task.

Hyrde’s power has grown ever greater. But so has that of the Nomun magelord, Ameldian. He now has the means to finish off the Arfolc remnant. The approaching confrontation will decide... can Hyrde and those she protects survive, or will the Nomun champion finally fulfil his vow to destroy them all?

• Language: English
• Publisher: David Lawrence
• Release date: Jun 23, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215495735

David Lawrence

David Lawrence has published more than nine hundred poems in North American Review, Midwest Poetry Review, Chicago Tribune, California Quarterly, William and Mary Review, Confrontation, ACM, Folio, Laurel Review,, Poet Lore, Mudfish, Hawai’i Review, People Magazine, New Laurel Review, Coe Review, Green Hills Literary Lantern, New Delta Review, Minnesota Review, etc. He has published a thousand articles in historical periodicals, such as “Daily Caller” and “American Thinker.” His book The King of White Collar Boxing (Rain Mountain Press) was a finalist for the Bakeless Nonfiction Prize (Breadloaf).

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Contents

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Motif

Hyrde

David Lawrence

Important Names

Hyrde

keeper, guardian. \ hear-da \

Ameldian

from: a-meldian

to reveal, make known what is secret.

Drysten

from: drý (n.)

magician, sorcerer, wizard, magus, malĕfĭcus

and: drys-líc (adj.)

fearful, terrible.

Bosworth Toller Dictionary

http://bosworth.ff.cuni.cz/

The realm of the spirit was not always so removed from us. There was a time when the veil between the seen and the unseen, the mortal and the eternal, was a mere vapour.

The lands of Tyros are still rich with fragments from that time, and our Novanta guilds are not the only remnant that endures.

  The people called the Arfolc are one such relic that survives. It is understood that the few still living among us today, believed to number no more than a hundred, are descended from a tribe that dwelt in Tyros before any of the races now occupying the land appeared. The mighty realms flourishing in our day were not even seedlings in the ground walked upon by the first Arfolc.

 Their true origins are vague. But the legends that tell of their close association with the Elohir, the sons of the Everlight, cannot be dismissed. Our own archives support the rumour.

  What cannot be disputed is the incessant hunting of the Arfolc over long centuries.

The chief culprits, by far, are the Nomun Brethren. Led by their magelords, the order bound themselves by oath to the destruction of the Arfolc people, for darkness always strives to overcome the light.

  The Nomun teaching that the Arfolc were not true humankind and were spellcasters of wicked magic was a mere ruse, a lie the brotherhood spread to conceal their hatred for anything to do with the Elohir, and none are tied closer than the Arfolc.

  Outmatched and facing a swift, merciless foe, the Arfolc seemed destined to be utterly swept away, unless help came. But how could anyone aid them against the power wielded by the Nomun wizards?

  At this desperate hour came Hyrde, barely reached womanhood, without discernable authority in her hands nor army at her back. Yet one for whom the veil was as of old: only a mist.

The Arfolc

Journals of the Novanta

Volume II

Part One

Part One

Hyrde had been on the move all day long, and all yesterday. And all the day before that. As the daylight faltered, the young woman pushed herself on; perhaps she could cover one or two more miles yet.

She had given up trying to avoid a battle with the blustering wind that hounded her. There had been no time for respite under shelter. Whenever the call came, it always required urgency. More than once, she'd wondered why the one who summoned her was not better prepared. It would make sense to have more time to reach the places she was called to.

The wind had been mild earlier in the day, gently playful with her long, auburn hair. Now it bore a chill and yanked rudely at her clothing, seeming to most resent her cloak’s hood, which she had to clutch onto. The moment Hyrde let go, tiring of holding it, a gust would gleefully tear the hood from her head with a spiteful shriek in her ears.

She allowed herself a peek at the small house perched on a grassy knoll across the open ground to her left. Just a glance, out from under her hood. It wasn't helpful to her, to look at homes along the way. Hyrde managed to ignore them, most of the time.

Lanterns had been lit inside and the cottages' small windows were aglow. A little figure appeared at one of them. A child, not easily distinguished from the distance at which she passed, but she thought it a boy. A second figure came into view behind the boy; his mother, no doubt. She leaned forward to peer out into the gloom. Then she raised hands toward the window frame and shutters were closed.

Hyrde doubted the woman could have seen her passing by. The window's uneven glass would offer only a reflection of the lit room, mostly. The shutters were not closed against her, only upon the unfurling night. But still her heart dipped as she trudged on.

Hyrde could sometimes forget, for a while, that she had no home. Forget that she was not part of a family, that she would probably never be. The shutters were a simple, brutally eloquent reminder: you are on the outside, and you’re never going to come in. Family and home are not for you.

But she did not falter, and her pace was as brisk as ever. She would march on. Far ahead, across rain lashed miles, by dry dusty roads and lonely paths there was a place for her. At least for a short while. Somewhere she’d been called to, somewhere she was needed.

Dusk had given way to a clear night sky brightened by the late-waxing moon. Travel was not hindered by darkness, but Hyrde could not go any further tonight.

She took her woollen blanket and food from her satchel.

With her back against an elm tree, she ate some strips of dried smoked bacon and a large piece of crisp-cake she'd made: pine-nuts and raisins bound with sugar and olive oil and baked.

Not all her journeying was so well provisioned. Thankfully she'd managed a brief visit to the town of Hartstone three days earlier.

Wrapped in her cloak and blanket, Hyrde reached into her pack again. She felt for the small book she always carried, and drew it out. The familiar leather cover felt good in her hands. In the dark she could not see the emblem upon it, but was content enough to trace its lines with her thumb. She had learned by heart every twisting pattern of every warding symbol in the book a long time ago. The magical, protective seals she could now weave were far more complex and much stronger than those in it’s pages. But she'd never laid the book aside. It was memory and identity.

Her thoughts turned to the time, years before, when she'd received the book, and first embraced the clear purpose that would this night, like so many before, chase away her loneliness.

~ Five years earlier ~

Hyrde.

The girl turned, almost stumbling over the jumble of split logs at her feet. Her fingers tightened instinctively on the stock of her hand-axe.

Don't be afraid, child.

The woman's face did not support the words with a smile. She looked tense, and tired. But she had a friendliness about her eyes.

The stranger had appeared out of nowhere, startling Hyrde. She hadn't realised that her firewood chopping had gotten so engrossing. But then, wasn't that part of the reason Hyrde enjoyed it, and was spending the morning preparing firewood for her little hut, even though there was no urgent need?

She could cast herself adrift on the simple, repetitive task, her world narrowing down to the strike point on each piece of wood she put under her axe. She made a mental note; be more careful, idiot.

Who are you?! said Hyrde, backing away from the intruder. She quickly determined that the woman would not catch her if she needed to run. Hyrde ran like a deer, a feat that looked well beyond the intruder's ability, who appeared to be well passed middle-aged. She stooped a little. Her weather-beaten face was lined, and somehow Hyrde knew that cares and sorrows had furrowed them as much as time had.

Even so, an orphan living on her wits was habitually wary, and Hyrde remained alert.

She watched the woman look away. To the foothills of the Frostforge Mountains? To the sky? Hyrde could not tell. Maybe she was summoning up lies, knitting a convincing story together behind those wistful eyes.

She turned her gaze on Hyrde again. I am alone. Like you. But I had a family, once, as you did.

The woman slowly bent to grasp a thick log Hyrde had cut from a storm-felled tree. She stood it on one end.

How did you cut these? Both you and the axe are too small. She hitched the skirts of her tatty robe and sat on the improvised stool.

Hyrde stared. She said nothing of her bow-saw lying in the grass, reluctant to so quickly enter into chit-chat. Therein lay smiles and informality, and not far behind that a dropping of your guard.

The woman sat in silence, perched