Chapter VI:
Leonara
Her Father
We must pause our narrative here, and turn our attention now to the daughter of King Vulcan, whose fate was soon to become entangled in the schemes of Lord Havoc.
King Vulcan, after he had slain his cousin, was given the Dual-Crown of Amlaman and Ramlos; the first king to possess it since the reign of Joplis, the founder of Amlaman. His crowning was soon reported throughout all of western Weldera. It became known how he reluctantly came to confront his cousin Voltan, whom he slew, thereby taking from him the dominion of the southern kingdom. His act was a welcome one though, and the people, with a few notable exceptions, submitted themselves to his rule willingly and even joyfully. He brought with him food and supplies, such as the people needed. He stripped Voltan's many children of their pensions and replenished the royal treasury. But what he took into the treasury he dispensed again to see to the needs of the people.
His kindness won him the loyalty of his grateful subjects. Yet it remained that Vulcan had usurped the throne, and slain his kin to do so. This act of injustice brought about so many good consequences that the people soon felt the need to make the injustice into justice. So the theory arose that the people had a right to overthrow their lord and master if he turned into a tyrant. There was a saying that became popular in those days which said, 'I have never heard of a king being murdered, only of a tyrant being punished.' Which meant to say that the gods would never allow a just king to be killed, but if a king became unjust, then the gods would raise up a savior to overthrow him. And to the people in those early years, King Vulcan was just such a savior.
After ruling for less than a year, King Vulcan began to rebuild and restore the ancient religion of Amlaman. This was all at Lord Havoc's advice, which the king very seldom ignored. But he was not, at that time at least, truly a believer. He was willing to go along with his fearsome benefactor's wishes, but he was not terribly interested in the whole design. But as he was not the sort of person that does things part way, he soon found that the greater part of his efforts turned toward matters of doctrine and religion.
The Temple of Agonistes had been restored and the people made a commitment beneath the terrible firelight, that they would be faithful to the dark god of their ancestors and bring revenge upon his enemies, Lord Pelas in particular. Thus bound by oaths and sacrifices, the people returned year after year for the feasts and celebrations and sacrifices. All throughout the land there was now talk of the will of Agonistes, revenge on Pelas, and the blessing the god had bestowed upon their once hurting land.
At the center of all these events was King Vulcan and his lovely daughter Leonara. Not long after her third birthday, Leonara was dedicated to the dark god. At every holiday she was present in the temple, as the Shining Jewel of Amlaman.
Despite his own reluctance, his daughter's importance in the ceremonial life of the Temple drew King Vulcan deeper into the world of religion. So much so that the world of politics began to suffer as a result.
As a father, though, King Vulcan loved his daughter dearly. He adored her, and he would have given up his kingdom for her sake, had he ever the need. But despite this he remained somewhat aloof from her. King's are not typically the most affectionate parents, as might well be imagined. When there are nurses and servants at hand, there is little need for the royal hand to set aside the scepter and pick up the wash-rag.
Despite what boldness he acquired when Lord Havoc was present, he was otherwise timid. This pushed him even further from his daughter, because it ultimately drove a wedge between him and Lady Marel, who seized upon this weakness in character to have her own will done throughout the land.
Her Mother
Lady Marel, on the other hand, was a believer. Her own family had long prayed to the dark god in secret, even before the Temple and the cultus were restored. She scarcely ended a sentence without including an, 'Agonistes be praised,' or some such benediction. She was distantly related to High Priest Achil, which she never failed to mention upon meeting someone for the first time. Nay, she rarely failed to mention her distant relation to the holy man in any of her conversations it seemed.
Little is known about her own childhood, aside from the fact that her family was not very wealthy and that she was a distant relative of King Voltan. At a relatively young age, however, she began to be groomed for royal life (and ultimately for Voltan's harem, as all eligible young maidens were in those days). But the death of Voltan came too soon and she escaped the fate that so many other young women of Amlaman suffered in those days. That is, exile with an infant and a pension to the marches of the kingdom.
It was quite a turn of luck for her, then, to suddenly move from such a sorry position to being the queen of a united kingdom. If she realized her good fortune, however, she never let on that she did. Her own personality was somewhat strong, and she was able to absolutely dominate her husband's will, even setting him against Lord Havoc at times. As the years passed they saw less and less of the famed knight, and she gained more control over matters political.
The Strange Situation
I said she was a believer. And there is a sad irony to be found in the marriage of Lady Marel and King Vulcan. Lady Marel loved Agonistes with all her mind and spirit, but ultimately she spent more of her time in the palace, ordering the kingdom, while her husband, who could scarcely tolerate the new religion, spent his time away from the throne ordering the details of the daily worship.
This strange circumstance arose partly from Lady Marel's resentment of the Sacred Virgins of Agonistes who served in the Temple. These young maidens were selected from among the most beautiful young girls in Amlaman and Ramlos and were brought up in the temple under the guidance and instruction of Achil, the high priest. It was a part of the worship that she accepted very reluctantly, and at times openly criticized. Going up the mountain to the Temple and seeing those infamous girls, dressed in white and looking to the people like so many brides was more than she could handle. King Vulcan soon learned that he could expect a sour temperament from his wife for a full week after each and every holiday feast.
But as the religion required on many occasions, the King's presence at the Temple, the only solution was to leave his wife behind at Japhrian, where she would take it upon herself to manage the affairs of the state, and avoid the unrest that followed her visits to Agonistes' mountain.
Contradiction
There are some who say, and who say wisely, that the greatest sin of all is hypocrisy. For in hypocrisy all the pretensions of mankind at wisdom and virtue are betrayed. It was through hypocrisy that Princess Leonara eventually came to despise her parents. Her parents were, to her, simply walking contradictions, creatures that spoke and acted in conflict with themselves and with one another.
She began to resent her father's timidity. He looked stately and regal in his great Hall, bearing an iron scepter in his hand. He was strong and fierce; it was well-known that he had slain his own cousin. But despite his strength and might, his spirit was very diminutive. He caved in to every counsel of Lord Havoc's and when he was finished doing the old knight's bidding he would turn to serve his domineering wife's wishes. He could spill his kinsman's blood under the command of Lord Havoc, yet he could not look his wife in the eye.
Her sentiments for her mother were little better. Her mother could turn her whole attitude and demeanor in an instant. She could go from wrathful and vengeful to charming and graceful in a mere moment. She might scowl at her husband or curse his name, but in a moment, when she perceived that there were others present, she would reform herself entirely and bless him with a smile. This drove Leonara to view her mother with contempt and suspicion.
All the conflicts of the parents had the effect of making the child likewise conflicted. Leonara soon learned to pretend, as her parents did, that everything was well and that there was no angst between them. She pretended to honor her father, she pretended to love her mother, and she pretended to believe
in the religion of Amlaman.
She also came to have a conflicted view of her own person. She felt in many ways better than her parents, but she felt worse at the same time. She felt beautiful and homely in turns and she felt both clever and foolish in a cycle. Pity and pride, hope and despair whirled around within her soul with the strength of a tornado. From one bad premise, many false conclusions will follow, and many true ones as well. From her parents' hypocrisy and foolishness she became a physical example of this very thing. She was lovely and despicable at the same time; but all of this was shrouded by her feigned grace and and false innocence.
The only thing in her life at that time that was not absolute fiction, was the affection she bore toward her brother Volthamir.
Volthamir
Volthamir alone, in her mind, was without contradiction. He didn't pretend to believe in Agonistes, he didn't pretend that Vulcan was honorable, and he would have nothing to do with the queen, a woman who occupied a place that had once belonged to the only kind soul he had ever known.
In him alone the princess saw no contradiction. Throughout her youth she looked up to him, both loving his stalwartness and envying his freedom. In her hopeless estate she began to see him as her only hope. Only if he could come and somehow make an end of her parents' rule, taking his rightful place upon the throne of Amlaman would she ever be able to shake off the shackles of tradition and live her life without the veil of pretension under which the whole royal family hid themselves.
But as the years passed her hope grew dimmer, and the more she wished to see him the less she did. By the time she was twelve years of age, he was rarely seen south of Heyan and by the time of her fourteenth birthday he came not to Amlaman at all. His fame came, and the many stories of his daring deeds and heroic battles came to the halls of Japhrian, but never the prince himself.
But in her fifteenth year, Volthamir returned to the palace for one brief visit. But this visit did as much to terrify her as it did to give her hope. When she left the Meeting Hall of Japhrian that night, her heart pounded and her head swirled. She did not know what to feel or what to think. But she found herself suddenly flanked by armed knights in her every move. Her father looked upon her with pity and there was a shadow of fear upon his face from that day forward. In her mother's eyes she saw nothing but envy and spite.
The Dark Gods Move
Every time that Princess Leonara was brought to Daufina to partake in the ceremonies at Sten-Agoni, she unknowingly passed by the mighty spirit Gheshtik, who now kept constant vigil on the Temple of Agonistes.
It had been fifteen years now since the day that the dark gods took council in the woods under the smoke of the temple while all of Amlaman and Ramlos were gathered around, and it had been more than eight years since Volthamir was forced to drink the Cup of Trial. Since that time Gheshtik had not left the mountain unwatched or unguarded. In ancient times he, conspiring for a time with Lord Pelas, had placed a mighty guard, a Gigas named Thewar, at the entrance to the Razzun Highlands. 'Let nothing pass; whether soul or flesh, do not suffer anything to slip by your unblinking eyes,' Gheshtik charged him. Thewar said nothing, but bowed his head low and took up his vigil in the wastes.
But even though he had set such a mighty guard in the place, he could find no peace. Zefru had returned to Sten-Agoni three days after the temple was rededicated with shocking news.
'The Gigas is gone, my lord, he was nowhere to be found.' Zefru was almost in a panic as he spoke. 'I sped off to Razzun with all the speed I could muster. The Gigas was not at the gate, nor was he near his usual marches. I searched the borders and the hilltops for the giant, but to no avail. My feet carried me through lands no mortal man has seen, and into dark places where even immortals fear to tread. I saw Death's Door and the Valley of the Dead, where no living thing dwells over which birds cannot even fly without falling into the wreaking bogs like stones. Yet for all this I saw no sign of the old giant.'
'This is ill news,' Gheshtik said quietly. 'Do not tell anyone of this, Zefru,' he commanded. 'Not yet. For the spirits still fear Agonistes, and many of them would be only too eager to place their necks under his yoke once again. But as for you and I, we know that fell Agonistes has no love for rivals.'
For fifteen years he had waited, but as time passed he grew more and more fearful and more and more certain that the dark god would return to Amlaman. 'He was too great to be lost in the subterranean worlds for so many years,' Gheshtik said. 'And he bears too much hatred toward Lord Pelas to leave this land without repaying his ancient grievances. He will return, and when he does he will strike at the throne of Pelas and at the sons of the Hero who bore Pelas' sword against him so many years ago.'
'Let us take action then,' Zefru said with a gleam of excitement in his eyes. 'It has too long a time since we have meddled in mortal affairs. This will be a joy for us all.'
Zefru left his side and charged away from Sten-Agoni to call the other spirits to the mountain. By the next day there had gathered some ten-thousand spirits to the mountain, some great and some slight and frail. These were charged by the thunderous voice of Gheshtik to, 'hold fast to every stone of this kingdom against the coming of its ancient master. The lesser spirits must speak lies to the people, to drive them away from Agonistes. The greater must find flesh to command. Let us raise up a Feral King in this land, so that if the dark one appears he will find his entry opposed by more than spirit and more than bone. But let no spirit take it upon himself to meet the dark one in combat. For such would be the doom of you all for many ages of the world. Some of you have forgotten the other ancient souls that once offended Agonistes. So long have they been lost in the fiery places of the world that their names and faces have long passed from our memories. Such will be your own fates if you do not hearken well to my warning.' Gheshtik paused for a moment and then thundered, 'Though your strength is ten times that of Thewar, touch not the dark god. I will slay him, for among us he has no other rival.'
The Princess and the Virgins
On the very day that the dark gods met to conspire against the return of their ancient lord, Princess Leonara was brought to the temple of Agonistes. Her coming was unannounced and save for a very small guard she was unprotected. This was so that she might be brought there without attracting any attention from the people. She was brought in a small wooden carriage, the sort by which the other young virgins are borne to the Nunnery. Great pains were taken to avoid the eyes of the people of Amlaman.
She wore no regal garb, nor any tiara or other jewelry, save for a simple gold chain that hung about her neck. Her long hair was braided and wrapped about the top of her head like ropes of gold. Her face was sullen and she would not lift her eyes from the ground. The carriage pulled up to the western side of the Nunnery and she was let out, aided by several strong knights of Amlaman. High Priest Achil was there to greet her.
'Come daughter,' he said with his wisdom-laden voice. 'You will be safe here. Peril comes not to this Holy Valley, not unless all other lands first fall. You know that it is said that a just king can never fail, and that an unjust king must fail. And Lord Agonistes is a god of fierce justice; he will not fail to protect that which is his. Now come, you must be weary. I will show you your chamber. You can dine with the virgins, for they also are dedicated to the god of Amlaman and Ramlos. You will surely find among them that sort of companionship that only exists between the pensive.'
Leonara said nothing. Her eyes were full of tears and she could scarcely stand. He wrapped a lucent white cloth about her shoulders and clasped it with a golden brooch upon her shoulder. 'You are under the care of Agonistes now, so do not fear.'
Soon Leonara was made to learn the ways of the Virgins of Agonistes. Though she had been dedicated to Agonistes as a child, as each of them were also, she was not properly speaking a Temple Virgin. There was some subtle and nonsensical distinction in their mode of service that allowed her to remain under the authority of her father rather than the authority of the prie
sts. She was meant to serve the religion in the same capacity, though with a few notable exemptions. The chief of these exemptions was that upon her no vow of permanent celibacy was laid, for in her body the royal blood was carried, which is a resource of greater worth than any number of Sacred Virgins. She was also, for the same reason, exempted from the Lot of Agonistes, that most corrupt of customs by which the Virgins were chosen to be victims on the Altar of the dark god. The girls, by their charms, had gained full control over Reonus, who was responsible for the selection. He saw to it that none of them met such a fate. There were fifty apartments for the virgins, but only twenty-five of them were kept occupied at all times. The rest were filled from time to time by peasants who had come to the mountain for refuge, or by those who had been accused of some great evil. Reonus, at the bidding of the virgins, saw to it that the Lot always fell upon one such as these, or upon one of the Virgins that had fallen out of favor in the eyes of Reonus and the others.
These exemptions left Leonara in the peculiar state of being the same, yet not the same as the other virgins. Envious of her beauty, and the special protections that hung over her by virtue of her parentage, the other virgins treated her harshly. They were not openly cruel to her, of course, as far as appearances were concerned they were like so many sisters. But in the peculiar ways of women, they cursed her with blessings and insulted her with kind words; saying nothing unkind, yet meaning nothing kind. And in the peculiar ways of women the Princess understood all of these things with their proper intentions, though perhaps another would have been unable to detect any malice.
In the end she could not abide their company and withdrew herself from the regular apartments to an empty chamber at the top of the northeastern guard tower. There she took her meals and spent her days in solitude.
One might have thought that the Sacred Virgins of Agonistes would spend their days in religious contemplation, or in memorizing the many attributes of the dark god, or reciting his hymns. And to a great extent such assumptions would be correct. But there were many other things that the 'Holy Virgins' practiced that the common people of Amlaman would not have guessed, though such things were well known to the nobility.
That they were well versed in coquetry would have been a surprise to many. The girls learned the arts of face-painting, so that their beauty would be magnified to draw attention. They learned to feign simplicity to hide their cunning. They were taught to speak and act innocently, though we shall see that this too was in conflict with the truth of the matter. They learned to bat their eyes when they spoke, to walk and sit in a specific fashion. In every particular they were taught to lure the attention of men toward themselves. In essence, they were each trained to be enchanting. And all their enchantments were refined and targeted toward one purpose.
For a price, wealthy men of Amlaman could bathe in the cool waters of the Meretris that ran through the Nunnery. But for such a sum, only those wholly unacquainted with human nature would remain of the opinion that a cool bath was all that was thereby purchased. Thus the young women of Daufina employed their enchanting arts and filled the treasury of Agonistes with gold and silver. The religious men, to cover this strange circumstance, made use of a strange ambiguity that existed in the language of Amlaman. The word 'Virgin' at once could mean just that, a virgin, but it had a secondary, though rarely used meaning of a 'woman who had born no sons'. Thus the holy men could unblinkingly declare these girls to be 'Virgins', knowing the whole while that the people were misled. To their own consciences it was sufficient that they spoke the truth, it mattered not to them whether the truth is what was heard.
In this aspect of the Temple 'service' Princess Leonara was exempted by royal command. But this only amounted to yet another reason that she was like, yet unlike the other girls, which only occasioned more ridicule and spitefulness. To Leonara's great frustration, despite the fact that the Nunnery of Agonistes was little more than a brothel, the honor and praises that were bestowed upon the other girls by the masses only grew.
Leonara envied their honors but despised their enchantments. 'Hypocrites! Hypocrites!' she would rage behind her locked door. The others turned to mocking her, making her out to be simple or overly modest.
'She is the truest believer in all of Weldera,' they would scoff. Others would interject in mock opposition that, 'she is, after all, the King's beloved daughter, so beloved that he sent her to the Nunnery.' This was to make a spectacle again of the fact that she was yet under her father's authority and protection. In response to their taunts she revealed to them her mother's serpentine powers of abuse.
'Double-faced whores!' she would call them whenever they crossed her, her face turning red with passion. 'It is fortunate that there are so many old men coming here for you to wallow about with, lest you grow desperate and take to the mud like the sows you are! Then your robes would finally come to resemble your bed-linens; stained by the mud of rich men's boots.'
She never learned the arts of coquetry, an art in which the Virgins were well instructed. But in the arts of spoken injury, she excelled each one of them. All the while that she remained with the virgins her mind grew ever more conflicted. And as she hated conflict she grew to hate herself even more.
Every night she would cry out for the one thing that remained constant in her eyes, the one thing that was not distorted by politics or dirtied by hypocrisy. 'Volthamir!!' she would weep.
Leonara's state of mind can be understood easily if we consider the fact that of all things perhaps that which is most unpraiseworthy is physical beauty. Yet it so happens that mankind praises and cherishes beauty more than anything else. It would be nonsensical to punish a man for being ugly. This is simply because his ugliness is not of his own making. The fault lies in causes that mankind scarcely can fathom; consequently, prudent men judge nothing based upon mere appearances.
The same faultlessness lies in the beautiful as well. Yet herein a great inconsistency exists in the behavior of men. For they never extend their indifference to the beautiful; though they will excuse the ugly, they never fully excuse the beautiful. Of the beautiful they compose songs and epic poems; they make sculptures and paintings, though there is more to be praised in the artisans' skill than in their subject. For the beautiful, almost to the same extent as the comely and the hideous, had no part in their own beauty. The praise then belongs to Nature, or to the gods, not to the woman or to the man.
This is plain enough to everyone that considers these matters, and it was certainly plain enough to the Princess of Amlaman. Honor is something that all of mankind desires, and to watch it fall upon those who are most undeserving of it is no easy thing to bear. The virgins of Agonistes were honored for nothing more than their beauty; while Leonara remained hidden in a tower, feeling as worthy as she felt worthless.
If we took the time to consider exactly what the purpose of beauty is, I mean, what is its purpose as far as we as creatures are concerned, we would be forced at last to admit that physical beauty and virtue are alien one to the other. Why does the flower show forth its colors and its aromas? Why does the fruit hang low upon the trees, tempting mankind with its sweetness? Why does the rooster strut about among the hens? Why does the bachelor set all his hairs in place and shear his beard ere his beloved draws near?
Does not all of beauty exist for the sake of the unborn, that is, does it not serve to make the unborn become the newborn? The hen and her chicks, the bees and the flowers, the man and his lover alike unwittingly serve the child that will be by their romance. Those who find their tongues wagging with praise for long eyelashes, a slender figure and a painted face should never on that account consider themselves to be wise.
But what is a woman to do, and what is a girl to feel in a world wherein even the greatest of men chase after that wherein there lies no virtue? Surely they must make themselves into the same things they abhor. But this, for whatever reason, Leonara could not bring herself to do. Whether it was because of some inner virtue or whether
it was, as she believed, merely cowardice, she did not seek after honor at the expense of herself as did her peers.
The result, however, was that she had to watch the world dance and sing the praises of the virgins of Sten Agoni, while she remained, aloofly, the princess in exile.
The Siren of Sten-Agoni
The presence of Princess Leonara in the Temple complex did not go wholly unnoticed by the outside world. Her voice, it was said, was more lovely than any other singer who lived in those days. So clear and beautiful was the sound of it that it drew the ear like a fish on a hook. For this cause she was called The Siren of Sten-Agoni by High Priest Achil.
It was said that the Sirens were the most lovely of all the creatures that were ever created. Each of their words were divine, and therefore as beautiful as a still crystal lake, and as warm as the summer sun. When Leonara sang, it seemed even the powers of nature calmed. But for all her loveliness, all that the other virgins could find in their hearts for her was enmity and jealousy. They took to being so cruel to her that she restricted her movements almost entirely to her bedchambers in the guard tower. And so miserable was she that she took no care to dust them or order her possessions. This only made her all the more miserable.
But despite all this, she would still find some way to sing her sad songs. She would wake in the midnight and hum her somber melodies to the full moon from the tower window. Or if she got a chance, she would have the guards take her out to the northern woods and she would slip away from their sight and sing her songs in some hidden glen. But such a lovely voice would soon draw her guards to her and she would be forced to return to her sorry abode once more.
The patrons of the Temple were at least partly aware of her. Those wealthy men who often visited the Nunnery told tales of strange bewitchments that lay on the mountain. 'The wind itself sings a lullaby,' some would say. There were rumors galore about this strange and sad vocalist, but Leonara was so elusive and secluded that people from the outside rarely perceived more than a distant tune, which they could easily believe to be some trick of their own imagination.
The word 'Siren' was not thrown out carelessly by the High Priest. 'It is a rare gift that this young princess possesses. Such as no mortal woman can bear without its turning to sorrow.'