In the time before the Great Flood, when human life was measured in centuries instead of decades, the Three Nations of Man are faced with the first great threat of world annihilation. The Fallen Star has commissioned a Betrayer to facilitate his will of destruction for all life and Light on Earth. N'nak, the adolescent son of a provincial merchant, suddenly finds himself in the midst of an epic struggle to save Earth from the first great annihilation. Previously irresponsible, he looks within himself as well as to his most trusted friend, the dwarf Grrumpf, to find courage. But when N'nak and his unlikely band of friends try to convince their leaders that they stand a chance against the forces of darkness in defense of the Light, they are met with skepticism. Faced with obstacles and lacking support, they must face evils they cannot imagine. Full of multidimensional characters, rich settings, and nail-biting action, this coming-of-age epic is for anyone who loves a great story. Join N'nak as he sets aside narrow interests and starts out on a quest to save the world from destruction in Song of the First Tiding.
Song of the First Tiding
By Robert Terry WatsoniUniverse, Inc.
Copyright © 2010 Robert Terry Watson
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-1-4502-0795-9Contents
Prologue.........................................xiii1. N'nak.........................................12. First Warning.................................73. The Kingdom...................................124. Antarcus......................................195. Vizar.........................................266. Bital.........................................307. Opening Moves.................................358. The Republic..................................439. Counterweight.................................5110. Intercalations...............................5711. First Blood..................................6312. The Kingdom Come.............................6913. Impact.......................................7414. Brindalut....................................7915. Oxitan.......................................8316. Coalescence and Conflict.....................8717. The Gathering Storm..........................9118. Breakpoint...................................9419. Encounter....................................10020. A Quest Is Born..............................10621. A World at War...............................11022. The Betrayer.................................11623. The Journey Begins...........................12024. Sangti.......................................12525. Recoil.......................................13026. Reunion......................................13727. Caincairn....................................14228. The Way Forward..............................14729. Interlude....................................15230. Land of the Masters..........................15731. Return of the Dwarf..........................16332. Winterlude...................................16833. Nadir........................................17234. Land of the Ancients.........................17735. Prelude......................................18536. Spiral.......................................19237. Circle.......................................19838. Ellipse......................................20339. Countdown....................................21040. Reset........................................21541. The Black Demon..............................22242. The Final Call...............................22743. Questpoint...................................23244. Inversion....................................23645. For Whom the Bell Tolls......................24146. Fortune......................................24647. Convergence..................................250Epilogue.........................................252
Chapter One
N'nak
"I-I'm sorry, N'nak." Esmeralda's soft, brown eyes looked to the earth that she wished would open and swallow her. Her cream hempen dress, the best her family could afford, flapped softly against her budding voluptuousness in the gentle afternoon breeze. N'nak could feel the pit of his gut tighten, as his world seemed to dissolve around him. He already knew what was coming, but it didn't make it any easier to bear hearing the words.
"Dream boy strikes again," he thought bitterly. The fading autumn sunlight glinted in the tears swelling in the corners of the young girl's eyes.
"Your music makes my heart soar, and I love the tales of your adventures with the dwarves and Freeholders," she said quietly, her words lined with pain. "But I can't live on music and tales. I've known you for most of our lives and I love you, but in the fourteen years since your Bloodrite, you haven't changed a bit. By the time you're fifty, you are supposed to be a man. That means responsibility and hard work, but you show no interest in either."
"B-but I can change. I just need more time," the youth muttered as he fought back the assault of his own tears.
"Sweetheart, you're out of time. It's all my family can do to put food on the table, working in the mines all day and the forges half the night. You are luckier than most here. Your father was able to build a successful business and work his way out of the mines. As his eldest son, you were all set to take it over, but instead of taking advantage of your special relationship with the dwarves to improve the tools your family makes and sells, you run off to Petralut to play, and return with useless toys for your precious bag of tricks. You left Jarak with no choice but to turn what should have been yours over to your younger brother."
N'nak winced inwardly as he recalled the pain on his father's face, and his own as well, at disappointing him, but also his relief and indifference at the loss of his inheritance.
Esmeralda burst loudly into tears as she covered her face with her hands and began to tremble uncontrollably. Her outburst shocked the youth back to the present. "Andrus has asked me to marry him."
"What? But we ..." he stammered. "You can't! He wouldn't!"
"I can and he did and I will," the girl replied, her bottom lip trembling, but her eyes now hard with determination.
N'nak erupted in rage. "My own brother! How could he?"
"He's earned it," she replied defensively. "He's done all the hard work while you've spent fourteen years playing around!"
The youth bolted upright from the fallen log on which they had been sitting, his self control completely lost to guilt and umbrage. "You can't do this! It isn't right! I won't let you! I'll ..."
Suddenly, a horrified gasp escaped through the cascade of Esmeralda's weeping. N'nak wheeled about to discern the source of her abrupt change of mood. There stood a being who seemed wrought of stone and steel. His skin was blue-white. He was as wide as he was tall, he wore shining armor so tight and flexible it seemed a second, silvery skin.
"Grrumpf, what are you doing here?" N'nak asked, all else forgotten.
An impossibly deep, gravelly voice replied, "N'nak, you must come with me now!"
* * *
N'nak frowned back at the distant, glowering eye of flame, its sullen redness spidering the jet intensity of the autumn night with bloody streaks that greasily highlighted the craggy peaks that framed it. Moving with the fluid stealth of a cat on the hunt, the muscular youth brought the magnascope to his face. Its design not only brought the distant scene right to his eyes, but lightened the nocturnal veil as well. The meaning of what he spied reflected itself in the grim faces of his companions. The broad dwarven faces, deeply lined, were scarcely expressive at the best of times, but now their thick, bluish lips were all distinctly set in deep, inverted crescents, their metallic, pupiless eyes a duller grey than normal. "Do you concur with our assessment?" rumbled the one called Grrumpf. His normally bluish-white face was flushed to a ruddy hue and his eyes showed a coppery cast, even at this distance from the flames. His voice was like low, distant thunder with a harmonic of rockslide. "I see a vast gathering of weapons and a mustering of bodies so great I can see no end to the streaming of them even with my foreyes on its strongest setting. You are right my friend. They are massing for imminent attack."
As one, the other dwarves in the party regarded the leader of their small, volunteer militia. Although N'nak, unlike most men, spoke Dwarventongue as intelligibly as the limitations of his vocal apparatus allowed, Grrumpf's subordinates looked to their captain for a response. Despite the healthy trade that went on between Dwarf and Man, there was much...
