Mentions of the wasteland grew in frequency after that. Picking up the last of the record books in the set, he soon encountered what he had begun to anticipate.
The wastes have passed the boundary. The slaves reported it to Kova, and when he told me I rode out to see it for myself. It has taken more than thirty years for it to touch my estate, though the dusts have preceded it since the day after the great blast.
Ashaki Tachika’s land is gone. Will mine and Valicha’s die in the next thirty years? Will my son inherit a doomed estate and future? Despite all the Ashaki say to deny it, their rejection of my son’s proposals of marriage to their daughters reveals their lie. Maybe it will be better if there is no grandson to inherit our troubles.
Not long after the entry, the handwriting changed. The son reported his father’s death and continued in the old man’s habit of brief entries mainly recording trade agreements. Dannyl’s heart was heavy with sympathy for the family, even after reminding himself that they were black magicians and slave owners. In the world that they knew and understood, they were sliding toward poverty and extinction.
Dannyl looked at his notes, leafing back to where he’d started. The record had begun a few years after occupation by Kyralia. The original author had been young, perhaps having inherited from an Ashaki who had died in the war. He wrote little about his Kyralian rulers. On the day the wasteland was created he described a bright light coming in his window, and later mentioned that it had taken three days for the slaves blinded by it to recover enough to work.
He did not speculate in the record on the cause of the light or destruction. Perhaps he was wary of putting any accusations or discontent toward Kyralians down on paper.
One last book remained of the pile he’d bought. It was a small and tattered thing, and grains of sand had worked their way into every fold and crack, suggesting it had once been buried. When he opened it he saw that the writing was so faded it was almost impossible to read.
He was well prepared for that. Librarians at the Great Library in Elyne had developed methods for reviving old texts. Some of these ultimately destroyed the book, while others were gentler and could revive the ink for a short time. How effective they were depended on the type of paper and ink. In either case, if pages were treated one at a time a copy could be made before they disintegrated or faded.
Taking out jars of solutions and powders from a box on his desk, he set to work testing them on the corners of a few pages. To his relief, one of the less destructive methods enhanced the ink enough to make the writing just readable for a while. He began to apply it to the first page, and as the words became clear he felt his heart beat a little faster.
The book, written in very tiny handwriting, had belonged to the wife of an Ashaki. Though she began each page with a heading suggesting that the text was about some domestic or cosmetic matter, the writing that followed quickly changed to matters of politics. “Salve for Dry Hair and Scalp”, for example, turned into a scathing assessment of the emperor’s cousin.
“Emperor”? Dannyl frowned. If there is an emperor, then this was written before the Sachakan War.
He read on, carefully treating each page with the solution and impatiently watching the words appear. Soon he realised he was wrong. The woman only referred to the defeated emperor by his title because she did not have an alternative, and the Sachakans hadn’t yet adopted the term “king” for their ruler.
Which means this diary was written some time after the war but within twenty years of it.
The writer had included no dates, so he had no way to know how much time had passed between entries. She never used names, instead referring to people by physical appearance.
Useful Cures for Womanly Times
Once a month a cycle of events brings many ills. Leading up to it there is often much anxiety, bad temper and bloating, and when the time comes it may be a relief, though it is always draining. The challenge is containment. The careless will experience leaks – often not noticing until it is too late. How else do I find out what the pale ones are planning? They trust the slaves, thinking them grateful for freedom. It is not hard to make the slaves talk. The crazy emperor knows. That is why he claimed the betrayer’s slave for himself. Better to keep an eye on it always. Take the hero’s property and you replace the hero in the slaves’ eyes. The crazy emperor wanted the pale ones to take our children and have their own people raise them. Make our little ones hate us. But the kind one argued against the plan and the others supported him. I bet they regret making the mad one their leader.
As Dannyl waited for another page to respond to the treatment, he considered the last passage he’d read. The woman had referred to the “crazy emperor” many times. He didn’t think the man was an actual emperor, just a leader. If the “pale ones” were Kyralians then this was the magician who had led them, Lord Narvelan. Dannyl was intrigued by the suggestion that Narvelan had adopted a slave as his own. The slave of the “betrayer”, who was also a hero. He squinted at the slowly darkening text.
Proper Manners Toward Visitors
Respect is given first to the Ashaki, then to the magician, then to the free man. Men before women. Older before younger. Theft is a great offence, and today our pale visitors were robbed by one of their own. By their own crazy emperor. He took the weapon from our throats and ran. Many of the pale ones have given chase. It is a great opportunity. I am angry and sad. My people are too cowed, even to take the advantage they have. They say the crazy emperor may return with the knife, and punish us. They are cowards.
From the way the writing changed from neat letters to a scrawl, he guessed that a jump in time had occurred in the middle of the entry and the latter part was added hastily or in anger. The reference to a weapon was not new – the diary’s author had referred to it already as a reason the Sachakans feared to rise up against the Kyralians. But now Narvelan had stolen it. Why?
How to Respond to News of a Rival’s Death
Our freedom is inevitable and comes at the hands of a fool! A great blast of magic has scoured the land to the north-west. Such power could only have come from the storestone. No other artefact or magician is that powerful. It is clear the crazy emperor tried to use it when his people confronted him, but lost control of it. We are rid of both of them! Many of the pale ones died, so there are still far fewer here to control us. There is fear that they have another weapon. But if they do not bring it here, my people will rise out of their cowardice and take back their own land. The land burned by the storestone will recover. We will be strong again.
Dannyl felt a chill run down his spine. In her excitement, the diary writer had referred to the weapon by its real name: the storestone. So if she was right, Narvelan had taken the stone. He had attempted to use it, lost control and created the wasteland.
It all makes sense when put together like that. Except that there is no obvious reason why Narvelan would steal the storestone. Perhaps he didn’t need a good reason if he was truly as mad as the records paint him.