CHAPTER EIGHT

FARCHRIST TALES

BOOK ONE:

STONE TO FLESH

After Gildegarde Brisbane had become a Knight of Farchrist, it was his duty to scour the land of evil and ensure the safety of the King and his subjects. This he did without quarter, defeating threat after villainous threat with his blade and with his wits. When Gregorovich Farchrist II decided to send a small party to Dragon’s Peak to dispatch the evil Dalanmire from his place on this earth, it included only the King’s own son, Gregorovich III, a dwarven ambassador to function as their guide across the Crimson Mountains and Desert of Despair, a high priestess of the Royal Temple of Grecolus to ensure a moral commitment to the quest, and Sir Gildegarde Brisbane. When asked if he feared for his life in such an endeavor, Brisbane answered by saying that in his experience, the bravest deeds often sprang directly out of fear.

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They stood before the wall of the oasis in a small group. There had been little discussion that morning. All had seemed occupied with their own thoughts. They all appeared ready for battle. Roundtower and Shortwhiskers wore their chainmail and carried shields. Brisbane wore his studded leather jerkin, as was becoming usual, and held the short sword that had been given to him before him like a torch to light his way. Roystnof wore no armor, but he had been studying his spell book since sunrise.

Once the group had crossed the wall and entered the garden itself, what little conversation there had been ceased completely, and they made their way through the trees and shrubs in silent determination. Shortwhiskers took the lead because he had seen in which direction the small stone structure sat from his perch the day before. Roystnof followed the dwarf and, in single file behind them, came Brisbane and finally Roundtower.

As soon as Brisbane’s feet touched the soft earth inside the wall he began to worry about coming across the basilisk. But now, added to his fears was the knowledge of what the basilisk could really do to him, the prison he could be shut in. His rational mind told him that even if he was turned to stone, Roystnof could turn him back just as quickly. But his fear told him that Roystnof would be unable to work the magic if something got to the wizard first. More than ever, Brisbane told himself, he would allow no harm to come to his magician friend. He did not want to spend eternity alone with his thoughts.

They trudged through the undergrowth as quietly as possible and Shortwhiskers led them with deliberate directness to their goal. They were going deeper into the center of the garden, and the trees became thicker and thicker as they went. Eventually, the canopy of leaves blocked out the sunlight altogether, and Brisbane found himself walking through a small forest.

Brisbane’s nerves were tense and they twinged at every snapped twig and rustle of leaves. He kept a firm grip on the short sword and kept his eyes open and roving. He saw no other life-like stone statues along the route and spotted many small furry woodland animals. He took both of these as signs that these woods were not patrolled by a platoon of basilisks, and that the one Roundtower had seen was a solitary beast.

Then, suddenly, Brisbane could see the glow of sunlight far ahead at the end of the makeshift path they were following. As they approached the light it became obvious that the trees were going to break into a large clearing. Brisbane could see over the heads of Roystnof and the dwarf, and his glances showed him that the small stone building which they sought stood in the center of that clearing.

Shortwhiskers reached the clearing and stepped aside to let the rest of the party in before advancing. Roystnof walked out into the sunshine followed closely by Brisbane and Roundtower. The four stood on the rim of a circular clearing about one hundred yards in diameter. In the center stood a twenty foot cube of stone with a black doorway facing the group. This was the structure they had come to see but now, none of their eight eyes were fixed upon it. They all looked at the human figure of stone that stood immobile in front of the structure.

Shortwhiskers spoke. “I think we have found the den of your basilisk-creature, Roystnof.”

“I’m not so sure,” Roystnof said. “That’s no natural formation of rock. Somebody built it.”

Shortwhiskers nodded. “Somebody that died long ago and when the basilisk found it empty, it moved right in.”

“The basilisk is not here.”

The voice belonged to Roundtower. The other three stared at the warrior.

“How do you know?” Shortwhiskers asked.

Roundtower kept his gaze in the distance and shook his head. “I’m not sure. But I can feel it. There is something in there, something evil, but it is not the basilisk.”

Brisbane did not understand how Roundtower could know this, but his voice carried the conviction of truth. Shortwhiskers was shaking his head, as if he thought the warrior was crazy, but Roystnof seemed very interested in whatever it was that Roundtower was sensing.

“Can you feel anything else, Ignatius?” the wizard asked.

“Roundtower slowly nodded, still looking off into the distance. When he spoke, it was as if he was talking in his sleep. “Yes. It is wrong. The evil is wrong. Not just in the way that all evil is wrong, but wrong because it is in this place. I feel this to be a place of such goodness that the evil festering here is nothing but the highest sacrilege.”

Brisbane stared at Roundtower’s chiseled face, remembering what the warrior had said the night before about the mistakes he feared he had made in the purging of evil.

Roundtower drew his sword and Brisbane saw the blade out of its scabbard for the first time. It was long, slim, and double-edged. The metal of the blade was of a type Brisbane had never seen. It had a sickly greenish tinge to it and appeared to glow a bit brighter than the strong sunlight could account for. The pommel was long as well, meant for two hands, but the weapon was quite obviously light enough to be wielded effectively with one. Set into the circular base of the pommel was one large emerald.

Brisbane felt an odd sensation wash over him as he gawked unconsciously at Roundtower’s blade. The weapon was strangely compelling to him, as if it bore some great significance in his life. Brisbane found himself wanting that sword, and a little voice inside his head told him that soon he would have it.

Roundtower suddenly stepped forward and began walking towards the structure. Brisbane looked at Roystnof and the dwarf, their faces saying that they could do nothing but follow the warrior. So, the small group approached the center of the clearing with Roundtower two or three paces ahead of the others. The darkness of the opening in the building remained an obscure void, and no matter how hard they tried to peer into its depths, it kept its secrets hidden from them.

Brisbane’s eyes scanned the circle of trees surrounding the clearing. He looked for any signs of movement, something that would reveal the monsters certain to be lurking in the shadows. But he saw nothing of any danger. He looked back at the building and was surprised to see how much distance they had closed during his glances about. The stone figure stood not ten yards away and the small building not twenty beyond that.

They gathered around the statue and began to circle around it like some totemistic children’s game. The statue had obviously been there for a long time. It was of a young man, older than Brisbane but younger than Roystnof, and its stone surface was worn and weatherbeaten. The man was dressed simply in a knee-length tunic and trousers. His hair was long and loose, and fell about his hollow face in stone clumps. He wore a backpack. He was devoid of any color as Roundtower had been, but his granite had a sickly gray-white stain in its pores, and it reeked of dirty rainwater.

“Another victim of the basilisk,” Roystnof said simply.

“How long do you think he has been here?” Brisbane asked, looking at the erosion running down the statue’s sunken cheeks.

Roystnof pondered. “Years, I would say. Perhaps more than ten. Perhaps even twenty. There is really no way to tell.”

Brisbane saw Roundtower shudder. He could only guess what the warrior was thinking after his weeks in solitary.

“Can you help him?” Roundtower asked the wizard.

“I can transform his back,” Roystnof said, “if that’s what you mean. But I don’t know if that would be wise now.”

“Why not?” Roundtower asked.

Roystnof pursed his lips. “Ignatius.” His voice was soft. “I know you may not want to recall it, but you know how your…well, how your sanity had deteriorated after only two weeks as stone. This one has been imprisoned for perhaps decades.”

The wizard’s words obviously had their effect on Roundtower. The warrior held his head low and had his eyes shut. Brisbane began to worry that maybe Roystnof had spoken too plainly when Roundtower brought his head up and spoke with clear eyes.

“The ordeal may well have driven him insane, but as long as he stays in this state, he will continue to suffer. I say you release him.”

Brisbane was a bit shocked at the tone of Roundtower’s voice. It seemed as if he was ordering Roystnof around. He looked at the mage with lines of concern in his forehead.

Roystnof offered a smile to Brisbane. “In our travels,” he explained, “my magical services have always been up to a vote of the party in circumstances such as this. Ignatius was only letting me know his feelings in this matter. Gil, I feel that you now have as much say as any one of us. What is your vote?”

Brisbane felt better about Roundtower’s reaction after this explanation. He still felt the warrior had been issuing an order, but he could reasonably attribute the tone of voice to Roundtower’s current state of mind. Brisbane himself did not wish to see the innocent suffer. But he also felt important now in spite of himself. Roystnof had more or less officially named him a member of their little group. He was tired of feeling like an outsider.

“I vote you free him,” Brisbane said with as much dignity as he could muster.

Roystnof turned to the dwarf. “And you, Nog?”

Shortwhiskers, who had been unusually quiet during the conversation, looked up at the wizard through his thick eyebrows. Brisbane saw an odd and almost angry look in the dwarf’s eyes, and his jaw was set in a way Brisbane had not seen before. It gave him a queer feeling that all was not well and he irrationally found himself wondering why Shortwhiskers’ whiskers were short.

Shortwhiskers spat. “I don’t like the smell of his stone. Let him rot.”

Brisbane was startled at the dwarf’s gruffness and Roundtower ventured a quizzical look at his smaller friend, but Roystnof ignored the tone of his response and simply took the vote as a no.

“Myself,” Roystnof said, “I vote to transform this man back to flesh, so the matter his settled. But I think we should wait until after we have explored the structure. Agreed?”

Brisbane and Roundtower agreed that perhaps that was best but Shortwhiskers only grumbled that he thought it was a bad idea whenever they decided to do it. The party turned their attention upon the stone structure.

It was a twenty foot cube of stone constructed of four great slabs of rock set upright and a fifth placed heavily atop their edges as a roof. The wall facing the approaching party bore an opening, five feet wide and ten feet high, and around this portal were strange glyphs and runes, carved into the rock. Standing this close to the entrance, Brisbane could see a few feet of the stone floor inside the building before the darkness swallowed the sunlight.

Shortwhiskers made a quick circle of the structure and reported no other entrances. The dwarf then stood before the doorway, peered carefully inside, and scanned the interior. He reported nothing warm-blooded inside. Brisbane thought that was odd, but the dwarf had been very specific. Nothing warm-blooded inside.

Roundtower was lightly running his fingertips over the engravings that surrounded the entrance when he cried out.

“I know these markings!”

The others gathered around. Roundtower spoke more to himself than to his companions. “I have not seen them used in a long time. They are ancient.”

Brisbane looked closely at the markings. They appeared as no more than meaningless scribbles to him. “What do they mean?”

Roundtower looked about as if noticing his friends for the first time. “They were used in the old worship rites of Grecolus. This one here,” the warrior said, placing his finger on a series of wavy lines crossing a circle, “stands for peace and safe passage for all loyal to Grecolus. The others are more obscure and I do not recall their individual meanings.”

Roundtower looked about at the blank faces of his companions. “Don’t you understand? This is a shrine of some sort. A shrine devoted to Grecolus!” The warrior’s voice was becoming quite agitated.

“And what of this sensation of permeating evil?” Roystnof asked.

Roundtower sobered. “As powerful as ever. That such a terror should inhabit such a holy place…it makes my blood boil. This evil is powerful, and I can still feel its presence.”

Brisbane was wondering how Roundtower could be so certain of this sightless evil when an icy voice croaked from deep inside the small building.

“Just as I can feel the presence of your holy blade, paladin. Come, and I will drown you in your own blood.”

The party froze. Brisbane at first thought he had imagined the words, but now he saw by the fear in the faces of his friends that it had chilled their bones, too. Brisbane had never heard the word ‘paladin’ before, but the voice from the shrine spoke it as a venomous curse.

Roundtower picked up his shield, which he had placed against the building, and tried to enter the shrine. Brisbane stopped him.

“Wait,” Brisbane said, unable to think of a reason. He only knew he was afraid of whatever it was that spoke in that horrible voice.

Roundtower turned harshly to Brisbane, but quickly softened his posture. He gently shrugged Brisbane’s hand off his shoulder. “I have been challenged, Gil. It is now a matter of honor.”

“I feel fear in your heart as well,” the cackling voice cried from the darkness. “I have won half the battle already. Face me, coward!”

Roundtower set his jaw. “And now I have been mocked. I must go.”

“Yes,” Roystnof piped in. “But not alone.”

The wizard brought his hand up in a sweeping gesture and spoke a single magic word. The darkened shrine exploded with bright light, shimmering from no apparent source. Roundtower held his shield before him as he entered. He was closely followed by Shortwhiskers. Before entering himself, Roystnof looked Brisbane in the face for a full second and slowly nodded his head.

This is it, Brisbane saw the wizard’s eyes say. This is forever the end of your peaceful life in Scalt as the son of Otis Parkinson the tavernkeeper. Step through this portal with me and hold onto your sword. For you need only your weapon, your wits, and the magic I have taught you to survive. It is a dangerous place that you go, but take heart, for you are not going alone.

Brisbane followed Roystnof into the shrine.

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This post appeared on Eric Lanke's blog, an association executive and author. You can contact him at eric.lanke@gmail.com.

The Future of Freedom by Fareed Zakaria

The most interesting thing about this book is that it was written in 2003.

The party is, at most, a fund-raising vehicle for a telegenic candidate. If a candidate is popular and wins the nomination, the party becomes supportive. That candidate then benefits slightly by getting more resources, organizational support, and new lists of potential donors. In fact, primary candidates find it useful to run against the party establishment. It gives their campaigns freshness and the appeal of the underdog battling the machine -- an approach that worked for George McGovern, Ronald Reagan, and Jimmy Carter. Today, however, this strategy is more difficult because there is no longer an establishment to run against. Who was the Democratic establishment’s candidate in 1992? Bill Clinton, Bob Kerry, or Paul Tsongas? None of the above. The success of George W. Bush was due not to his being  the candidate of the establishment but to his being the candidate of his family; he had the two things you need in a partyless system -- name recognition and a fund-raising machine. Anyone who has both, whether they have any experience in politics or not, is now at a huge advantage. Thus, in this new, more “democratic” system, we have seen many more political dynasties, celebrity officials, and billionaire politicians than before. And this is only the beginning. As the political party declines further, being rich and/or famous will become the routine path to high elected office.

For most of American history, presidential candidates were reflections of their political parties. Today, parties are reflections of their candidates. If the candidate moves to the center, the party moves to the center. If the candidate bucks left, the party bucks left. Once Clinton was elected as a “New Democrat” it became difficult to find any old Democrats in Washington. And when George W. Bush announced that he was a compassionate conservative, the rest of the Republican Party discovered that was what they had been all along. The political party today is an empty vessel, waiting to be filled by a popular leader.

That’s some pretty good analysis of what we have, in fact, witnessed in the twenty years since it was written.

And there’s another section that seems eerily prescient -- although much less intentionally so. In describing the rise of fascism in Germany in the 1930s, Zakaria says this:

Germany at the turn of the century seemed to be moving in the right direction toward democracy. Then came World War I, which killed 2 million Germans and left the country devastated and was closed with the punitive and humiliating peace of Versailles. The years after Versailles saw the mass flight of ethnic Germans from Poland, Russia, and other eastern lands into Germany (a migration that produced immense social turmoil); hyperinflation; and finally the Great Depression. The liberalizing strains in German society were overwhelmed by much darker ones, and political order collapsed. In particular, hyperinflation -- which Niall Ferguson has aptly called an “anti-bourgeois revolution” -- wiped out the savings of the middle class and utterly alienated them from the Weimar Republic. The country became easy prey for extreme ideologies and leaders. It is common to read history backward and assume that Germany was destined to become what it became under Hitler. But even the United Kingdom and the United States had their ugly sides and desperate demagogues who grew in strength during the Great Depression. Had those countries gone through twenty years of defeat, humiliation, chaos, economic depression, and the evisceration of their middle classes, perhaps they, too, would have ended up being governed by demagogues such as Huey Long and Oswald Mosley rather than the statesmen Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill.

And now here we are, twenty years later, twenty years filled, for some sectors of our society, with defeat, humiliation, chaos, and the slow eroding of our middle class, and here we find ourselves more susceptible than ever to demagogues instead of statesmen.

But the best part is the piece that hits home what is only slightly alluded to there. Why didn’t the demagogues who grew in strength during the Great Depression take power in the United States, as they did in Germany?

Supporters of free markets often make the mistake of thinking of capitalism as something that exists in opposition to the state. When it is time to pay taxes, this view can seem self-evident. But the reality is more complex. Although in the twentieth century many states grew so strong as to choke their economies, in a broader historical perspective, only a legitimate, well-functioning state can create the rules and laws that make capitalism work. At the very least, without a government capable of protecting property rights and human rights, press freedoms and business contracts, antitrust laws and consumer demands, a society gets not the rule of law but the rule of the strong. If one wanted to see what the absence of government produces, one need only look at Africa -- it is not a free-market paradise.

In the developing world, the state has often had to jump-start capitalism. Again this mirrors the European example, where modern capitalism began with the state taking large tracts of agricultural land from the hands of feudal lords and using it in ways that were more market-friendly. This move broke the back of the large landowners, the most politically reactionary group in society. As important, millions of acres of land were moved out of stagnant feudal estates, where they lay underutilized, and into a market system. The new owners, often the farmers who tilled the land, used the land more efficiently, since they now had an incentive to do so, or they rented or sold the land to someone who would. In other words, it took a massive redistribution of wealth to make capitalism work.

They didn’t because the state provided the infrastructure necessary for capitalism to survive, much like the redistribution of land in Europe that helped capitalism take over from feudalism. In one of those weird coincidences of life, on the day I am writing this I began reading The Common Good by Robert Reich, in which he makes the same point even more bluntly. To paraphrase, the government and capitalism are not in opposition to one another. In the sense that it is the government (or the Leviathan, if you prefer) that provides the infrastructure of laws and property rights that allows capitalism to function, the government is capitalism.

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This post first appeared on Eric Lanke's blog, an association executive and author. You can contact him at eric.lanke@gmail.com.

A Holiday Break: The Color of Money by Mehrsa Baradaran

Books are always the best holiday gift for me. The only thing I like better than the anticipation of reading a long sought after title is the fondness that comes with remembering the discovery of an unexpected treasure.

As I look back on all the books I've profiled here in 2024, the one I'd most like to revisit is The Color of Money by Mehrsa Baradaran, which I blogged about in April.

Here's how that post began: 

This is an incredible book. Given the subtitle, “Black Banks and the Racial Wealth Gap,” and the quote from The Atlantic on the cover: “A deep accounting of how America got to a point where a median white family has 13 times more wealth than the median black family;” I decided to start counting all the ways in which, throughout American history, the deck was knowingly stacked against the economic freedom of black people. Even I was surprised by how many instances I was able to count. 

There are, in fact, 27 items on this list, and they represent a troubling set of actions taken in the United States, perpetrated over the entire course of American history, to curtail the economic development of its black citizens.

It's a list worth revisiting ... as so much of it seems to fall out of our awareness. But so is Baradaran's closing diagnosis, a description of why the system perpetuates, and what, if anything, can be done to reverse course.

There have been major political and social roadblocks to dealing effectively with the wealth gap, and each of history’s potential reformers has faced them. The biggest roadblock is inherent in majoritarian democracy itself. If reform is seen as zero-sum, the institutional structure of American government resists any wealth transfer viewed as a benefit to a minority of the population. However, there is a way to overcome the resistance by convincing the majority that reforms aimed at a segment of the population will benefit the entire population. For example, passage of civil rights laws was made easier when policymakers became aware that communists and other foreign enemies were exploiting Jim Crow and using it in propaganda against the United States. When civil rights came to be seen as a matter of critical foreign policy import, it was actively pursued. To point this out is not to cast doubt on the sincerity of individuals or groups pursuing reforms or to throw an overly cynical taint on monumental changes, but it is to acknowledge the reality of human nature and democratic governance. Then, as now, the public must be convinced that their own interests are aligned with the advancement of racial minorities or that they will not suffer when others are promoted.

As you enjoy your holiday break, I hope you find some time to curl up with a good book. I know I will.

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This post first appeared on Eric Lanke's blog, an association executive and author. You can contact him at eric.lanke@gmail.com.

CHAPTER SEVEN

FARCHRIST TALES

BOOK ONE:

STONE TO FLESH

When my grandfather, Gildegarde Brisbane, was eighteen, he was selected by the priests as the first Riser. They said that devotion such as his was rare in a man so young and that, with continued dedication to Grecolus and his laws, my grandfather was destined for greatness. While serving his squireship under Sir Gregorovich Farchrist II, it was his job to perform all the menial tasks his Knight gave him. Care of the weapons, tending of the horses, shining the armor—Gregorovich II was known to say that he never before had met a man who threw so much of himself into everything he did. It was as if the young Brisbane only wanted to do the best he could do.

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Roundtower awoke near sunset. He emerged from the tent with the look of health and the complaint of hunger. Brisbane went about heating him up what was left of the stew. Roystnof and Shortwhiskers sat stiffly nearby, as if afraid to ask Roundtower about his ordeal.

Roundtower began to eat and an oppressive silence hung around the campfire.

“Ignatius,” Roystnof said, his voice sounding too loud over the crackling firewood. “Do you remember what happened to you?”

“Yes,” Roundtower said in a distant voice, not looking up at the wizard. “But I do not understand it.”

“Do you remember the creature you saw in the garden?” Roystnof said. “The large lizard you were going to point out to Nog?”

“Yes,” Roundtower said, speaking into his stew. “It was brown and it had eight legs. And its eyes. Its eyes…” He trailed off.

“Ignatius,” Roystnof said. “It is called a basilisk. It has the power to turn men to stone by its gaze. When you looked into its eyes, you were so effected. You have been standing as a statue of stone in that garden for more than two weeks. Nog witnessed your transformation and came to me with the news. It is my magic that has freed you. Do you understand what has happened? Do you understand what I am telling you?”

Roundtower lifted his head and gave the wizard a long stare. He then looked at Shortwhiskers, who nodded his head in verification. Roundtower swallowed hard and mumbled very quietly to himself.

“I thought I had died.”

Only Brisbane was close enough to hear these words.

“You must remember,” Roystnof went on, “who you are and what your life has meant before this transformation took place. Now, is there anything—”

“Roystnof,” Roundtower said, snapping into a normal tone of voice and cutting the wizard off. “I appreciate what you have done for me, and what you are trying to do now. It is hard for me to accept what has happened. I have never heard of such a creature that can turn men to stone, but I can only trust what you say as the truth. The time I then spent as stone,” his voice faltered, “was difficult and trying for me on a very personal level. I expect it will be some time before I am over the experience. But I do remember who I am, and I have every intention of continuing on with the natural course of my life.”

Roystnof said he was glad to hear Roundtower speak so, and quickly dismissed the subject out of respect for the warrior’s wishes. Shortwhiskers then commenced in telling Roundtower all that had happened since his original transformation to stone. The dwarf’s search for Roystnof, his meeting Brisbane—whom he called Parkinson as Brisbane himself had done to Roundtower—the journey to the garden, and the process of transforming Roundtower from stone back to his own flesh. Intentionally, or so Brisbane thought at the time, the dwarf left out the part about Roystnof teaching Brisbane how to cast shocking grasp. It really wasn’t all that important to the story, as Brisbane had not used the knowledge in the one circumstance when it might have proved helpful. The battle with the ogres, however, was the only part of the story where Roundtower showed any true enthusiasm.

When Shortwhiskers finished his tale, Roystnof brought up the subject of exploring the garden in the morning.

“I am very curious,” the wizard said, “about the stone structure that Nog saw at the center. I am sure it will at least give us a clue as to why this oasis is here.”

“But what about the basilisk?” Roundtower asked.

“It is an obstacle like any other,” Roystnof said. “I am confident it can be avoided or overcome.”

“I would not like to be turned to stone again,” Roundtower said. “And what of the three of you?”

“Anyone,” Roystnof said, “who has the misfortune of being turned to stone, I will be able to transform back.”

“And you?” Brisbane said. “What do we do if you meet the monster’s gaze?”

There was a silent pause before Roystnof answered.

“I will not.”

Brisbane and the others could not argue with such conviction, although Brisbane found it a bit foolhardy. He had known Roystnof for a long time, but was just now beginning to see another side of him. Brisbane was not sure he liked it.

“I suggest,” Roystnof said, “that we vote. I say we investigate the stone structure tomorrow. Nog?”

Shortwhiskers nodded. “My curiosity has been tickled. I will go with you.”

“Gil?”

Brisbane looked at Roundtower before he answered. The warrior was clearly wrestling with the decision. “I will go as well, Roy.”

Roystnof smiled. “And Ignatius?”

“Friends,” Roundtower said in an ominous tone. “For a reason I do not understand, I feel compelled to join you in this endeavor. Perhaps, inwardly, I wish my revenge on this basilisk, but the reason is really not important, for I am coming along.”

Brisbane was relieved to hear this. He was already beginning to like Ignatius Roundtower and wanted

to get to know him better. Both Roystnof and Shortwhiskers were wearing broad smiles.

“However,” Roundtower continued. “I must say that this will be the last such adventure we will share. Something happened in the time I spent as stone that has made me realize the path my life has taken. This experience has allowed me to see how I have lost sight of my own dreams. I will join you on this one last excursion, and then put an end to this part of my life. Afterwards, I will leave for Farchrist Castle, and start my squireship as soon as one of the good Knights will have me.”

No one seemed pleased with Roundtower’s decision, Shortwhiskers perhaps getting more emotional than he would have wanted to appear, but Roundtower held firmly to his words. Roystnof suggested that they get some sleep before the morning and Shortwhiskers reluctantly agreed, grumbling that he would have a hard time falling asleep. Roundtower volunteered to stand first watch, as he had slept most of the day away. Brisbane felt a little foolish remembering that they had forgotten to post a watch the previous night. Of course, it had been pouring rain. Roundtower surprised Brisbane when he asked the young man to sit up with him for a while.

Roundtower sat down on a large rock and Brisbane settled on a smaller one next to him. The warrior gazed up at the first twinkling stars for an extended moment. Brisbane sat and stared at him. Roundtower was out of his armor now and wore clothing so plain they could only be meant to cover his nakedness. His hair was sandy brown and cut short in a rumpled mop on his head. His muscles were large, but not as large as Brisbane’s. He looked like someone who could stumble into The Quarter Pony and receive no odd stares from the regular patrons.

“I have heard the others call you Gil,” Roundtower said, still looking into the sky. “May I call you this, too?”

“I wish you would,” Brisbane said.

Roundtower looked at Brisbane with troubled eyes. “Gil,” he said. “I need guidance of a sort I do not expect you will be able to give, but I also feel compelled to speak of my ordeal. I’m sure either Nog or Roystnof would be happy to listen to me, but neither of them share my faith, and because of that, I do not believe they would truly be able to understand my plight. I will seek out a patriarch when I have the chance, but for now, I feel I must share a portion of my suffering with someone who keeps the proper beliefs.”

Brisbane twitched inside at these last three words. He had seen this attitude before and it had always left him idealistically parched. The worship of Grecolus was widely accepted by its followers as the only true religion. When it recognized other beliefs at all, it characterized them as a mythology constructed to answer philosophical puzzles or an underdeveloped culture’s interpretation of the works of the single holy god Grecolus. Brisbane had not had much experience with other religions, but he did not think this viewpoint was as widespread among them. Hadn’t Shortwhiskers said something about dwarven and human gods?

Roundtower must have caught an indication of Brisbane’s discomfort on his face. “Oh,” he said quickly. “I’m sorry if I have made an incorrect assumption. I just thought that since you have lived your whole life in the Valley of Farchrist that you would have been raised in the King’s faith. Have I made an error?”

“No,” Brisbane said, unsure of what he should reveal to this total stranger whom he wanted to be his friend. “No, I have been raised in the worship of Grecolus. My mother and stepfather have seen to that.”

Roundtower smiled knowingly. “It can often be difficult when you are young. Things can seem so uncertain without the benefit of experience.”

Brisbane sat before the warrior in silence for a few moments, not knowing how to respond to his comments. “Please,” he said eventually. “Tell me what you planned to.”

Roundtower nodded. “Yes, thank you,” he said. “As I said, I plan to seek the advice and counseling of a church patriarch when I can, but there are things that I need to work out now. There are some issues that have been forced upon me that cannot wait for that. You see, when this basilisk creature turned me to stone as Roystnof says it did, I thought it had killed me.”

“Yes,” Brisbane said. “I heard you mumble that earlier. I’m not sure I understand the significance.”

Roundtower looked at Brisbane with eyes wide in amazement. “I am killed by a sneak attack by some foul lizard,” he said melodramatically, “an attack so swift that I neither see nor feel the approach of death, and when it is complete I find myself in an afterlife of total emptiness. There is nothing there. No light, no sounds, no scents. It is an infinite plane of void, in which I find myself and nothing else. I do not even have a physical form or, if I do, I cannot perceive it in any fashion. I am merely my thoughts, my consciousness, alone in a universe unto myself.”

Roundtower shuddered again at the memory and Brisbane began to realize how horrible that fate could be. Not just for Roundtower, but for anyone. The isolation, the utter seclusion, with not even the inanimate to occupy your attention. It would drive anyone mad after a while. But it was Roundtower who had been cursed with this glimpse at such a nihilistic afterlife, and it was Roundtower who had such a strong faith in the wisdom and goodliness of Grecolus.

Roundtower cleared his throat. “I cannot describe to you the betrayal I felt. I was actually angry at first. Here I had spent my entire life in merciless devotion to Grecolus, following the doctrine he set down for his servants to live their lives by, and when I did finally pass from this world into the next, I find myself abandoned and alone. Eternal life is one of Grecolus’ promises to his flock, that all who believe in him shall not truly die, but live forever with him in the heavens. If I had died, why did I not see the holy light of Grecolus? Why did I not hear his powerful voice speaking my name? Why did I not feel his guiding hand on my shoulder?”

Roundtower had held his watering eyes up to Brisbane’s face, but now he hung his head and folded his hands between his knees. “That is when I stopped being angry and began to feel my true anguish. The answer to those prideful questions suddenly stared me in the face like all the evil creatures I have killed with my blade. I was not in the heavens because I did not deserve to be there. The holy life I thought I had led had really been a sham.”

Roundtower went suddenly silent and Brisbane felt very uncomfortable during the quiet. He did not know what to say to Roundtower, or even if anything should be said at all. Personally, he still was not sure whether he truly shared the warrior’s faith or not, but he felt like an impostor here. He felt like an unbeliever sitting there listening to Roundtower’s pain.

“Your life has not been a sham,” Brisbane heard himself say, hoping even as he said it that Roundtower would not leap up and ask him just how the hells he knew that.

“No, no,” Roundtower said, wiping moisture from his eyes. “It has, it has.”

The tone of Roundtower’s voice was beginning to make Brisbane’s stomach churn. He began to feel nausea washing over him and he did not know why. Brisbane didn’t really care why, he just did not want to get sick. Brisbane stood up and began to walk aimlessly away.

“Gil?” Roundtower said, his face popping up.

Brisbane stopped at the edge of the campfire’s glow. His back was to Roundtower.

“Please, Gil,” Roundtower said. “I need to finish this.”

Brisbane slowly came back and sat down. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I am not feeling well.” He put a delicate hand on his stomach. “I think it’s something I ate.”

Roundtower swallowed hard. Brisbane realized the warrior was now going to rush through what he had left to say for Brisbane’s sake. That made him feel even worse.

“My faith is strong,” Roundtower said. “I am sure of that. But now I can see all the mistakes I have made in my life. I now realize that I have not been a sinless servant to my Lord.”

“No one is,” Brisbane said automatically.

“Yes, no one is without sin, I know. But the things I have done. I cannot begin to describe what evil I have seen in my travels. I set out on these journeys originally to eradicate that evil from the earth—to do Grecolus’ work—but in the prison in which the basilisk trapped me, I began to see my adventures in a different light. I saw that my intentions had slowly changed, their focus moving from completing a holy mission to obtaining a personal wealth and power. No longer was it my purpose to destroy evil in order to tip the balance of universe to the holy, but I killed the evil creatures I encountered to steal the treasures they hoarded in their caverns.”

Brisbane did not say so, but this transformation Roundtower had undergone reminded him of what Shortwhiskers had said about the dwarven god Abbathor, the Great Master of Greed. If Roundtower thought his change in purpose had been brought about somehow under the influence of Damaleous—who Brisbane was trying to equate in his own mind with Abbathor—he might have found yet another similarity between the human and dwarven mythologies.

Roundtower paused to look into the sky at the white moon Grecolum, still full to visual observation. “I hate to admit it,” he said quietly, “especially to you, Gil, but I can only say that my associations have taken me away from Grecolus and brought me slowly under the influence of the Evil One.”

It was at once what Brisbane had wanted and what he had not wanted to hear the warrior say. Linking his personal shortcomings to Damaleous was one thing, but to his associations?

“What do you mean by that?” Brisbane asked.

Roundtower looked back into Brisbane’s tense face. “I am sorry,” he said with deep sincerity. “I can tell you care for him a great deal, and over the years I too have come to consider him my friend. But I must face facts. He is a wizard. He does work magic. Even if he does not recognize it, Roystnof can only be considered a servant of Damaleous.”

Brisbane no longer felt sick to his stomach. He was quite suddenly burning with rage. He stood up and stammered over some syllables, trying to find the right and most appropriate thing to say. How can you say that after he saved you from your stone prison came to mind, but that was off target. He considered flatly denying the accusation, claiming that Roystnof was not a servant of Damaleous, but he knew that argument would be fruitless with Roundtower. He almost allowed himself to call Roundtower a horrible name, but even that, Brisbane decided, would not be direct enough. There came a moment when Brisbane didn’t think he would be able to say anything at all, and it was then that the perfect words came into his mind.

He flavored them with as much sarcasm as he could muster. “Are you trying to tell me that you have decided to try and kill Roystnof, too?”

Roundtower stood up. “Gil, please. Sit down. I could no more kill Roystnof than kill myself. Let me finish.”

Grudgingly, Brisbane sat.

Roundtower lowered himself onto the rock and continued in a low voice. “Being dead, or rather turned to stone, showed me one other thing. It showed me that my own judgment could not be relied upon when choosing what evil to combat and why. When I first took up my blade, it all seemed so clear cut. Good and evil. Black and white. But when I look back upon things, I see that life is not that simple. There is a lot of gray in my black and white world, and a lot of things that defy definition as either good or evil.”

Brisbane’s temper was cooling as the warrior spoke. He was beginning to feel ashamed that he had reacted so uproariously.

“This is in part the reason I have finally decided to try and become a Knight a Farchrist. I have a strong arm in combat, and I have always wanted to use this skill against the enemies of Grecolus. But for too long now I have been going at it alone—choosing my own evils to destroy. I shudder to think of the numbers of errors I may have made in judgment. But the Knights are a holy order, and it is said that the King can talk to Grecolus himself. There, I would receive the guidance I need to really put my sword to the use of good. There, I would never be unsure in my conquest of evil.”

Brisbane could understand this reasoning, but he did not see how one man’s judgment would be better than another’s. Not in matters as difficult to define as to what is good and what is evil. “And what is the other part of the reason you seek the knighthood?”

Roundtower’s eyes grew dark. “Because I want to make certain that when I really do die, I will stand with my creator in the afterlife.”

Brisbane pursed his lips and thought again of how little faith he had in the religious instruction he had been given. He knew it would be easy to accept what he had been taught, easy to follow the words of Grecolus, easy to live life according to his scriptures. Easy, peaceful, and comforting, yes. But was it right? That’s what kept Brisbane guessing. Was it right?

“I hope you do,” Brisbane said.

Roundtower smiled and stood. Brisbane felt he was expected to stand as well, so he did. The warrior extended a hand and Brisbane shook it.

“Thank you, Gil,” Roundtower said. “Thank you for your attention and your kind ear. There is more to tell, but I already feel purged enough to continue with an untroubled mind. Go now and sleep well. I will stand watch. If I tire, I will wake our friend Nog to relieve me.”

“I’m sure he will appreciate that,” Brisbane said with only a touch of sarcasm.

Roundtower laughed. “Yes. I’m sure he will.”

There was no rain to warrant crowding the tent with a third body, so Brisbane spread out his bedroll on the grassy earth, took off his boots, and laid down on his back. He folded his hands behind his head and began to think of all the things Roundtower had said as he stared at the stars and waited for sleep to overtake him.

I must share a portion of my suffering with someone who keeps the proper beliefs.

The proper beliefs. Didn’t all religions consider their beliefs to be the proper beliefs? They must. Only a fool would worship a god he knew to be false. But if all faiths considered only themselves to be the true one, how could the actual true religion make itself known? No religion, as far as Brisbane knew, had concrete evidence of its veracity. If one had, wouldn’t everyone follow that one? Why could the dwarves envision more than one god and humans could not?

I thought I had died.

Roundtower certainly found himself unprepared to face death and Brisbane wondered how he would fare. If there was no afterlife, there was nothing to prepare for. You live and you die. If he died slowly, Brisbane thought he might feel regret for things he had or had not done in his life, but a quick death would leave no time for such worries. He would blink out of existence and that would be it. If there was an afterlife, however, and it was as he had been taught it was, Brisbane felt he would be unprepared for his demise. He may shuffle himself back and forth between belief and disbelief, but he knew that Grecolus would easily and justifiably label him an unbeliever and that he would spend eternity in any one of the Nine Hells. That seemed unfair to Brisbane, that he should be punished for not believing things that could not be proven. It was his nature not to believe in things blindly, and that nature had been created as a part of him. But if Grecolus did exist with his infinite powers, would it not be wise to do his bidding regardless of your own personal beliefs? And if there was an afterlife, but it was unlike anything Brisbane had been taught, how could he possibly prepare for it, not knowing what it was? He may actually be unconsciously prepared for it now, and any conscious attempt to prepare for it may make him unprepared.

Roystnof can only be considered a servant of Damaleous.

Brisbane still fumed at the accusation. He knew little of the worship of the Evil One, but he did not see how Roystnof could be practicing it. Brisbane had known him for six years and they had been close from the start. Throughout the time he had secretly studied magic under Roystnof’s tutelage, the wizard had never mentioned Damaleous as the source of his power. He had said the power came from within the magic-user. It was an inherent force present in everyone, larger in a few and barely detectable in most. When Brisbane cast his first cantrip at the age of thirteen, he did so without selling his soul, signing a contract in blood, summoning a demon, or fornicating with one. He had just reached deep inside himself, concentrated on what he wanted the cantrip to do, and tapped into an unrealized power to make the study door unlock by itself. Either Roystnof practiced devil worship in secret and had sold Brisbane away to evil forces without his knowledge—an idea Brisbane found ludicrous—or his magic was not derived from the Evil One.

Brisbane yawned, starting to get sleepy.

Or maybe, the power inside himself that Brisbane could tap into actually was Damaleous, living inside Brisbane’s own body.

There is a lot of gray in my black and white world.

Black and white. That was what Otis had taught Brisbane the world was like. Good and evil. A man either gave his heart to Grecolus or he did not. Those who did were christened the Good, and those who did not were labeled the Evil. But wasn’t it only the Good who did this labeling? What did the Evil think of the label given to them by the Good? What did the Evil call themselves and what did they call the Good? What does a bat call the daytime? Roundtower said there was a lot of gray in this supposedly black and white world, many things that avoided the labels of both the Good and the Evil, and Roundtower had certainly seen more of the world than Brisbane’s stepfather. Besides, Brisbane already knew about the existence of the gray. He was about as gray as one could get.

It is said that the King can talk to Grecolus himself.

Conversations with a god? What would one say? How could one assume a friendly tone when speaking with an Almighty? The maker of heavens and earth? Brisbane could only imagine it as the most humbling experience. Wouldn’t even the most saintly cleric feel like a sinful wretch under such a commanding stare? What if one said something to displease the god? The worrying alone could drive one insane.

Brisbane was now beginning to drift off into slumber. His thoughts strayed to dream-like sensations of reality. He imagined his mother was still alive, as he often did, her face clean and smooth, without a trace of age, decay, or death. He remembered the time Roystnof gave him the silver pentacle pendant, which now lay still in the crevice of his throat. He imagined rushing home to show his mother and Otis the gift, but instead of Otis, in the wandering of his mind he replaced his stepfather with his real father, the man he had never known. The senior Brisbane hugged his child closely and told him to keep his pendant safe and to treasure it.

Just before he fell asleep on that night spent outside the strange oasis in the Windcrest Hills, Brisbane thought automatically of Allison Stargazer, and without the restriction of reflection he imagined the warmth of her body pressing against his.

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This post appeared on Eric Lanke's blog, an association executive and author. You can contact him at eric.lanke@gmail.com.