The Way of Edan (The Edan Trilogy, #1)

by Philip Chase

Bolthar wrestling the bull, Sithfar hidden in his cloak and holding his staff, Syn and Logan striving with ice and fire, Halmar riding the whale, Dyna with a sheaf of wheat, lovely Glora with her flower garland, and Regnor and Hruga seated over all.

“Yes. Like life itself. No one knows the song of origin of the elves, for they’re outside of time. Yet they’re of this world, though they don’t live in it as you and I do. They show themselves in the forests and waters, where life is strongest. Oh yes, long ere our people came to Eormenlond, long before the Andumae came, and even long before the Dweorgs, elves dwelled in Iltharwyn, the ancient forest that became the Southweald and Northweald after our ancestors came and clove it in half. The Andumae say looking upon an elf brings the death of Anghara, or as we here call her, Angra. The spirit returns whence it came without the body’s death. The body’s end is the death of Oruma, or Orm,

a mob in Caergilion had murdered three priests sent to convert them, and that King Malruan of Caergilion refused to punish the murderers. King Earconwald and the supreme priest of the Way, the mighty wizard Bledla, were gathering their strength in Torrlond to retaliate. The news caused excitement in Kinsford, though few reckoned it would change anything in their corner of northwestern Eormenlond.

Joruman was no such fool. He did not need religion as a false comfort to cloak the stark truth from him.

Those in power pandered to the delusion that after their corpses had rotted, the people’s miserable lives might continue if only they would believe hard enough in Edan. Armed with such faith, they would go to war and kill and die. Pathetic.

That was the only real hope for the best of humanity — those with sufficient amounts of both the gift and intellectual courage — to emerge in their rightful places and guide civilization into what it should be. It would be painful,

Truth was not arrived at through mystical prophecies or the misunderstood ravings of a madman recorded by his zealous followers hundreds of years ago in a book to which one must surrender one’s mind. It was only the mind that could conceive truth through meticulous study and the courage to face the darkness. Only through that long and noble process could there be any hope of reaching the furthest frontier of all, of achieving the greatest conquest.

Above all the other gods, Regnor and Hruga gazed down with benevolence from their thrones. Bolthar’s muscles strained as he grappled with the maddened bull. From Syn’s gaping mouth a freezing vapor curled toward Logan, whereas he shot raging flames from his hands toward her. Dyna’s arms opened in blessing over a field of wheat. From the rough sea emerged Halmar atop a giant whale, while Glora glided above him on a graceful swan. Aloof from the others, Sithfar stood shadowed in his cloak and seemed to point his staff at the viewer, as if in warning that soon he would accompany him or her on life’s final journey.

By the time the Andumae found them, the Ilarchae had been massing in northeastern Eormenlond for perhaps a century. Though they at times sent ships to fetch timber from the Ironwood, the Andumae never settled the rough lands beyond the Amlar Mountains. In the Ironwood dwell elves and wolves and ancient beasts, and in the eastern Amlar Mountains the trolls and dragons remain in greatest numbers. At their eastern end lies Slith, greatest of fens, wherein dwell foul aglaks.”

My power shall be reborn in the one who awakeneth and beholdeth the world anew. It is this one who shall save Eormenlond from destruction, and such will be the true Prophet of Edan.’”