[puffyn]

---- Arcoscephale, Turn 28 ----

(From The Collected Sayings of Pandokos the Prophet: In his first incarnation)


"They came for our holy girls," said the woman of Tolk. "We wept, for their sacrifice would be in vain, but we hid a few away so that our priestesses would not face Ma'era empty handed."
"They enslaved the spirits of warriors who perished defending our lands, a dozen tree-lives ago, and caused them to turn on us, and chase us out of our homes, until the land was populated only by ghosts," said the old man of Vorgun.
"First they took all the girls, holy or not, and killed those who were not useful, except a few of us who hid," said the young maiden from Horslund. "Then they came back and took anyone who could work, leaving the old and sick to die because there is no-one left to till the fields or chop the wood or churn the butter."

And Pandokos of the impressive range of facial colors grew very stern..."


There is a holy marsh here, where the corpses of people killed in battles do not decay, but float beneath the surface, unable to leave the swamps even in death. The people light candles here, which burn for months, whenever there are new corpses. There are a lot of lit candles, and there would be many more if there were anyone left to light them. If I were in better humor, I would find it amusing that the first time I have left the marshes for a year and a half would find me returning again and again to this one patch of swamp, in what is otherwise a fine land of tall oaks and and evergreens.

I am not amused.

When Balachandra came to me Last week, with another ragged band of half-starved refugees, his eyes could have melted stone. These people, though they seemed more dead than alive to me, were from the north, where they had lived peaceably on the edge of the forest and the swamp before the raiding party wiped out their entire village of thousands. This is the third group this week, raged the inferno in the eyes of my oldest friend in these lands. This has gone too far, rumbled the avalanche. Balachandra is always such a mild, reasonable man. We must act now, roared the tempest. I wonder how Amshula would have implored me? I wondered, idly, before giving the orders to march. We left by nightfall.

There are very few people here, at least who dare to show themselves, though I suspect there are many more hidden in dark, forgotten corners of the woods. Far too many villages are entirely empty, food left half-eaten on dinner plates, here and there a pool of dried blood, a charred corpse. In more than one burnt shell of a house, there are whole families clustered together around the fireplace, with no signs of violence, sometimes holding hands. In a low voice, Andromache explained that it is better to die quickly with the ones you love. She alone walks through the villages without a look of dazed horror on her face, as if she had seen this sort of thing many times before. She probably has.

At Last we came to a village where the corpses were still warm to the touch, and found what we were looking for, scuttling down the road to the north. We quickly slew the band of slavers, and rescued half a dozen villagers, most of whom were too dazed to be able to give a coherent story. But one man told me that I should go see the old woman who never left the sacred grove. Outsiders are not permitted to enter, he said, especially not military men who lack respect for life. But she would talk to me.

And indeed, though I had never seen her before, she greeted me as if picking up a conversation we had left off the Last evening. "I was waiting for you, Pandokos."

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