D'Saferate Family/Corwin/Journal/7

Chaper 7: Light of Fountain

I left north-eastward, towards the part of the continent I had yet to explore. I heard tales of the war ahead and braced myself, if this was anything like the wars of Atamara, I would have to walk carefully. I also heard rumors of a new nation being formed, in the Isles where I had recently worked alongside Perdanese nobles. Obsidian Isles, it was called and I could hardly wait to see what the birth of a nation was like.

I traveled across the mountains in Scio and Akesh Temple and was informed by a sign that I was in Light of Fountain. Up here it was hard to imagine this as a country besieged by war, here it was calm, and tranquil. A priest of the local religion stopped and talked a while with me, he told me the some of the more grizzly details of the siege and famine of Fontan City and how LoF was faring in the war. I thanked him and asked a few questions about their gods and immediately regretted it. Never ask a preacher about his religion unless you want your ear talked off!

I headed down the mountainside, deeper into Light of Fountain, constantly fearing being challenged or caught in a skirmish. After a days travel I came to a Light of Fountain encampment in Tokat. I was take into custody and questioned for fear of being a spy, but it turned out that hey had heard of my arrival and were expecting me. I was free to wander around the camp and talk to the soldiers, but I couldn’t advance to Fontan city because it was besieged.

The men and women I talked to seemed tired and angry and expressed their hatred of Fonatan openly. I heard more rumors of starvation inside the besieged city and decided I had to do something, or at least try. I dressed myself up in a peasant’s cloak and I covered it in grasses and twigs for camouflage, hoping to slip by patrols and see with my own eyes what was happening.

I left the Light of Fountain camp at dusk and crept along a small ditch used for irrigation. There was an eerie silence in this no-man’s-land, one I didn’t care for at all. My mind was racing… all it would take was for one archer to see me and it would be the end of career as an author. Dead men tell no tales after all.

Luckily I encountered no archers, just a scout who promptly called a half dozen soldiers. I surrendered, of course, and they gave me the option of dying right there or coming with them. I chose the latter and thought to myself, “these guy’s aren’t half bad.” That was until they threw me into a jail cell. It was dark, damp and cold. I wrote to Lady Lilith of Fontan, telling her that I was a traveling author and had no part in the war between Light of Fountain and her realm. I reminded her that I had informed her of my coming and I was just going to see what was happening in Fontan city. She never wrote back. No one did. I sat in the cell for six days before some of the guardsmen (who I shall not name) helped me escape.

I managed to mingle in with a few refugees who were being sent back to Fontan city. After spending almost a week in a dirty cell and still wearing my dirty cloak, I blended in nicely. I expected them to open the gates for us, but there was no need, they had been smashed while I was rotting in prison and Fontan was busy raping and pillaging in the city called Fontan.

Hatred is a strong word, and I use it very sparingly, but what I witnessed that day made me feel just that. I hated humankind for what we could do to each other. The city was burning, there were screams everywhere, and piles of corpses higher than me. Most of the bodies were pale and thin from lack of nourishment so I was unsure if Fontanese troops had killed them or starvation. To think that Fontan would try so hard to reclaim a city, the city that their realm is named for, and then do this to it! I had to get out of there! I couldn’t bear to be there any longer.

In the end I stayed. Fontan hadn’t fully taken the city, and there was still something I could do. I wrote to Pontefix Lycastus, begging him to surrender the city, hoping to prevent further collateral damage. I also wrote to some of my friends across the continent, hoping to urge their bravest traders to help feed the city. I got many replies, but all said that they would love to help, but their own cities were suffering. Only one person wrote to me and told me that they already had their country’s infiltrators working on bringing food to the starving, I thanked them profusely and decided to leave before Fontan troops found me again.

They did. Just as I was slipping out of a postern gate, a soldier saw me from the walls battlements and demanded I stop. Then it was right back to the same dungeon. The same cell really. I wrote more letters to Fontan’s judge and ruler, but I suspect they just burned them. I wrote to Lycastus, but he was missing. Another six days passed.

I escaped again. I ran. It was all I could do to keep running. I ran until I was exhausted and the air was fire in my lungs. I ran until I stumbled, felt a sharp pain and lost consciousness. Luckily a Light of Fountain patrol picked me up and dragged me back to the mountains. I learned that Light of Fountain had given up fighting for Fontan city and were trying to establish a new capital in Akesh Temple. They invited me to view the ancient catacombs there, but I refused. I had had enough. I left as fast as I could west, thanking the good people of Light of Fountain for all they had done for me. Zedd, Lightining, Hannibal, and Reginald II to name a few. My original plan was to visit Fontan next, but I thought it unfair to go there in my current mental condition plus I don’t want my work to be biased by my personal experiences. I needed some rest and relaxation. Plus I didn’t want to be thrown in jail again. There was only one way to go though, and that was back around west, through Perdan, to the Obsidian Islands. I thought it kind of strange, yet fitting, that I should go from the destruction of one realm to the birth of a new one.

In all honesty I didn’t have the chance to see much of Light of Fountain’s culture while I stayed there, although I did note their inspiring dedication to their people and religion. Even when everything was at it’s worst, they gathered strength from their beliefs and struggled on. I hope to visit Light of Fountain again one day, to better understand these hardy folk.