Tales of the Long War Read online

  The Volk saw Rowanoco the Earth Shaker and saw a being of strength and honour who they adopted as their father. The Dvergar were not so fortunate, for they saw their God in a moment of anger as he smote the Water Giants and birthed the Krakens.

  The Volk became strong and honourable, the Dvergar became wrathful and all-consumed by death.

  Generations were eaten away as the two brothers fought, until the Volk emerged victorious and banished the Dvergar beneath the ice. However, the dark ones were not idle and they built their own realm in the darkness, and bred. They bred and they waited, all consumed by the need to destroy and impose a divine death on the world above.

  THE TALE OF TOR FUNWEIR

  The Stone lands were fertile and warm. The vast plains of Leith grew enough crops for everyone. The seas of Kirin and Canarn provided fish. The mountains provided security, and the followers of the Stone Giant were content.

  But the covetous barbarians of the north and the sly viziers of the south wanted the green lands for themselves. The Giants of fire and ice allied to assault the Stone Lands, but they were turned back by fearless men of stone. The One God blessed his followers with strength and gave them clerics – the first mortal men to harness the divine.

  The men of ice were defeated, and the men of fire fled. At the head of the army of stone was Dashell Tiris, a man blessed with the power to rule. He united the feudal lords of stone and rode before a banner of purple, with an army of clerics behind him.

  The Stone Lands became the Kingdom of Tiris. The people rallied behind the One God and great designs formed a great realm. Art, culture and craft flourished under the family of Tiris.

  Then the clerics seized power. The Purple declared themselves nobles of the One God and, marshalling armies of Red churchmen, they toppled the Kingdom. The lords of Tiris remained, but only as figureheads, and the land became Tor Funweir, a theocracy of order.

  THE TALE OF RANEN

  The Men of Ice were as tough and rugged as the lands they claimed - the Realms of Fjorlan, of Greywood, of the Green-Eyed Lords, of Twilight, of the Sirikan Vale, of the Grass Sea. There was little unity, but there was always Rowanoco. There was always strength, freedom and honour.

  They fought with each other and they fought with the Men of Stone. They fought with trolls and they fought with ice spiders. But, above all, they fought with the land. Harsh winters and leagues of lifeless tundra bred a race of uncompromising men and women, people who revelled in the good days and grew tough in the bad days. But still there was strength, freedom and honour.

  The followers of Rowanoco remained the same for centuries, until the Men of the Stone became the men of Ro and decreed that they had the right to rule all the lands of men. The war was terrible. When the dust settled, the southern lands had been subjugated and renamed by the Ro – Tor Ranen.

  It was in this moment, when millions of Ranen had been denied their freedom, that Rowanoco gave his greatest gift. The Order of the Hammer appeared, the first priests of Ranen. They strode from Fjorlan into the Grass Sea and freed every man, woman and child under the yolk of the One God. They Formed the Free Companies and fought the Ro back to Tor Funweir. From that day on, the disparate realms of Ranen became the Freelands, united under a single creed of strength, honour and freedom, and to never again be slaves.

  THE TALE OF KARESIA

  When the Jekkan Caliphate fell, they left behind echoes of their power, no more so than in the vast Fire Lands. The simple human nomads that herded and foraged in the deserts learned to stay clear of the ruins, fearing that the chaos magic would corrupt them.

  Over time, as the humans spread and explored, and formed villages and towns, they found that they could no longer ignore the well-springs of Jekkan power. A man appeared, claiming to speak for Jaa. His name was Karesh and he called himself the Wind Claw. He and his followers directed folk into the ruins. Thousand died as the Wind Claws studied the magic, attempting to harness it for the glory of Jaa.

  Generations passed, until some showed immunity to the chaos, and were named Viziers. They founded a city called Thrakka and twisted the magic into spires of great majesty, proclaiming Jaa’s victory over the ancients. The nomad tribes united behind the Wind Claws, and accepted Jaa as their master.

  The Fire Lands, soon to be called Karesia, flourished under the power of the Viziers. Trade and culture came to the deserts, and great cities were woven into the sand – an empire built on fear, but an empire that grew strong.

  We hope you enjoyed this book.

  For more information, click the following links

  Bestiary

  About A.J. Smith

  About the Chronicles of The Long War

  An Invitation from the Publisher

  BESTIARY

  COMPANION WRITINGS ON BEASTS BOTH FABULOUS & FEARSOME

  THE TROLLS OF FJORLAN, THE ICE MEN OF ROWANOCO

  History does not record a time when the Ice Men did not prowl the wastes of Fjorlan. A constant hazard to common folk and warrior alike, the trolls are relentless eating machines; never replete, they consume rocks, trees, flesh and bone. A saying amongst the Order of the Hammer suggests that the only things they don’t eat are snow and ice, and that this is out of reverence for their father, the Ice Giant himself.

  Stories from my youth speak of great ballistae, mounted on carts, used to fire thick wooden arrows in defence of settlements. The trolls were confused by bells attached to the arrows and would often wander off rather than attack. Worryingly, there are few records of men killing the Ice Men, and those that do exist speak of wily battle-brothers stampeding them off high cliffs.

  In quiet moments, with only a man of the Hammer for company, I wonder if the Ice Men have more of a claim on this land than us.

  From ‘Memories from a Hall’ by Alguin Teardrop Larsson,

  first thain of Fredericksand

  THE GORLAN SPIDERS

  Of the beasts that crawl, swim and fly, none are as varied and unpredictable as the great spiders of Nar Gorlan. The northern men of Tor Funweir speak of hunting spiders, the size of large dogs, which carry virulent poisons and view men as just another kind of prey. Even the icy wastes of Fjorlan have trapdoor Gorlan, called ice spiders, which assail travellers and drain the body fluids from them.

  However, none of these northerners know of the true eight-legged terror that exists in the world. These are great spiders, known in Karesia as Gorlan Mothers, which can – and indeed do – speak. Not actually evil, they nonetheless possess a keen intelligence and a loathing for all things with two legs.

  Beyond the Gloom Gates is a land of web and poison, a land of fang and silence and a land where man should not venture.

  From ‘Far Karesia: A Land of Terror’

  by Marazon Vekerian, lesser vizier of Rikara

  ITHQAS AND AQAS, THE BLIND AND MINDLESS KRAKENS OF THE FJORLAN SEA

  It troubles me to write of the Kraken straits, for we have not had an attack for some years now and to do so would be like tempting fate. But I am the lore-master of Kalall’s Deep and it must fall to me.

  There are remnants of the Giant age abroad in our world and, to the eyes of this old man, they should be left alone. Not only for the sake of safety, but to remind us all that old stories are more terrifying when drawn into reality.

  But I digress. The Giants of the ocean were formless, if legend is to be believed, and travelled with the endless and chaotic waters wherever tide and wind took them.

  As a cough in Deep Time, they rose up against the Ice Giants and were vanquished. The greatest of the number – near-gods themselves – had the honour of being felled by the great ice hammer of the Earth Shaker and were sent down to gnaw on rocks and fish at the bottom of the endless seas. The Blind Idiot Gods they were called when men still thought to name such things. But as ages passed and men forgot, they simply became the Krakens, very real and more than enough when seen to drive the bravest man to his knees in terror.

  From ‘The Chronicles
of the Seas’, vol. IV,

  by Father Wessel Ice Fang, lore-master of Kalall’s Deep

  THE DARK YOUNG

  And it shall be as a priest when awake and it shall be as an altar when torpid, and it shall consume and terrify, and it shall follow none save its father, the Black God of the Forest with a Thousand Young. The priest and the altar. The priest and the altar.

  From ‘Ar Kral Desh Jek’

  (author unknown)

  THE DOKKALFAR

  The forest-dwellers of the lands of men are many things. To the Ro, arrogant in their superiority, they are risen men – painted as undead monsters and hunted by crusaders of the Black church. To the Ranen, fascinated by youthful tales of monsters, they are otherworldly and terrifying, a remnant of the Giant age. To the Karesians, proud and inflexible, they are an enemy to be vanquished – warriors with stealth and blade.

  But to the Kirin, to those of us who live alongside them, they are beautiful and ancient, deserving of respect and loyalty.

  The song of the Dokkalfar travels a great distance in the wild forests of Oslan and more than one Kirin youth has spent hours sitting against a tree merely listening to the mournful songs of their neighbours.

  They were here before us and will remain long after we have destroyed ourselves.

  From ‘Sights and Sounds of Oslan’

  by Vham Dusani, Kirin schola

  THE GREAT RACE OF ANCIENT JEKKA

  To the east, beyond the plains of Leith, is the ruined land. Men have come to call it the Wastes of Jekka or the Cannibal Lands, for those tribes that dwell there are fond of human flesh.

  However, those of us who study such things have discovered disturbing knowledge that paints these beings as more than simple beasts.

  In the chronicles of Deep Time – in whatever form they yet exist – this cleric has discovered several references to the Great Race, references that do not speak of cannibalism but of chaos and empires to rival man, built on the bones of vanquished enemies and maintained through sacrifice and bizarre sexual rituals. They were proud, arrogant and utterly amoral, believing completely in their most immediate whims and nothing more.

  Whatever the Great Race of Jekka might once have been, they are now a shadow and a myth, bearing no resemblance to the fanged hunters infrequently encountered by man.

  From ‘A Treatise on the Unknown’ by Yacob

  of Leith, Blue cleric of the One God

  THE JEKKAN SERVITORS

  The war did not last long. The Great Race of Jekka had no desire for the forests. At length we fought them back to their mountains and threw down their altars.

  But their pets had to be defeated. As the masters fled, their servitors covered their retreat. They were terrible, amorphous things of no fixed form, shaping their flesh as their masters ordered.

  Fire did not burn them, arrows did not pierce them, blades did not cut them. Only the touch of cold caused them to flee. The mightiest Tyr wielded swords of deep ice and the wisest Vithar conjured snow and freezing winds.

  The servitors were defeated, though it cost many lives. In the long ages that followed, whispers remained of the terrifying beasts, that they skulked in Jekkan ruins or guarded long-forgotten lore, but they were never again seen by Dokkalfar.

  From ‘The Edda’ Author Unknown but Attributed to the

  Sky Riders of the Drow Deeps

  VOLK WAR HOUNDS

  In ages past, the Volk of the northern ice were bound in an eternal war with their cousins, the Dvergar. They came from the dark lands, scratching like insects across the snow. Generations, beyond the understanding of men, were consumed with bitter conflict until the Dvergar gained the ascendancy.

  In their darkest moment, the Volk priests screamed to the sky, asking Rowanoco for aid, and the ice giant sent the white pack.

  Great hounds from Sovon-Kor gained intelligence and allowed the Volk to saddle them. They felt no fear and valued loyalty above all. They plunged into battle as a wave of death, annihilating any Dvergar that stood before them.

  The white pack bred until there were thousands of war hounds, each one bound to a Volk master from birth to death. But as their masters died, the ageless hounds went forth into the world to do the work of Rowanoco.

  From ‘The Ninth Book of Higher Xar’

  by Orrin Scarlet Beard of Van Clos

  About A.J. Smith

  A. J. SMITH has been devising the worlds, histories and characters of the Long War chronicles for more than a decade. He was born in Birmingham and works in secondary education.

  Find me on Twitter

  About the Chronicles of The Long War

  In the long ages of deep time, uncountable millennia before the rise of men, there lived a race of Giants.

  Continents shifted and mountains rose and fell as the Giants fought the Long War for the right to possess the lands of their birth. The greatest Giants, mortal beings of huge size and power, lived long enough, fought hard enough and gained enough wisdom to become gods.

  Rowanoco, the Ice Giant, claimed the cold northern lands and was worshipped by the men of Ranen. Jaa, the Fire Giant, ruled the burning desert sands to the south and chose the men of Karesia as his followers. The Stone Giant, known only as the One, held dominion over the lush plains and towering mountains of Tor Funweir, and his followers, the men of Ro, believed they had the right to rule all the lands of men. Other Giants there were also, though their names and their followers are thought lost, and their empires buried, as victims of the Long War.

  The Giants have long since left these lands to the humans, but their followers still worship them, invoke their names daily and aggressively maintain their laws. The Giants themselves sit beyond the perception of humans in their halls beyond the world while their most trusted followers fight the Long War in their stead.

  Find out more

  Find out more

  Find out more

  Find out more

  Visit Head of Zeus now

  An Invitation from the Publisher

  We hope you enjoyed this book. We are an independent publisher dedicated to discovering brilliant books, new authors and great storytelling. Please join us at www.headofzeus.com and become part of our community of book-lovers.

  We will keep you up to date with our latest books, author blogs, special previews, tempting offers, chances to win signed editions and much more.

  Get in touch: [email protected]

  Visit Head of Zeus now

  Find us on Twitter

  Find us on Facebook

  Find us on BookGrail

  First published in the United Kingdom in 2016by Head of Zeus Ltd

  Copyright © A.J. Smith, 2016

  The moral right of A.J. Smith to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  9 7 5 3 1 2 4 6 8

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN (E) 9781784976262

  Head of Zeus Ltd

  Clerkenwell House

  45-47 Clerkenwell Green

  London EC1R 0HT

  www.headofzeus.com

 

 

 
; -ms-filter: grayscale(100%); filter: grayscale(100%); " class="sharethis-inline-share-buttons">share