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The House of Moons – Extract

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The House of Moons

Jeremy Lambert

Each and every night, Velithor was defeated.

He would relive memories. Moments in time, frozen. Whole armies stilled by his mind, all so he could envision a different outcome. One that did not end with him here in this forsaken place. It never worked.

So many memories, so many choices made and deaths averted. Everything to protect aelven life and realm… Choices made to the best of his ability, regardless of the result.

But all his efforts had earned him was an ancient museum atop a forgotten mountain.

Lord Regent Velithor Cellenya, entrusted protector of the Moon Gate and its garrisoned Tower of Tyrr in the Lunarest Mountains… a post in which ‘any fool could succeed’, according to Lord Regent Lyrior Uthralle himself.

An easy assignment. The one no one wanted, because all of them knew what it meant and none more than Velithor, who was still nursing his pride from his latest rout. It was the lowest, the least prestigious, given to the Lord Regent least trusted by Tyrion and the council: an easily defensible tower and gate blocking the mountain pass, far from pillaging forces… complete with a ceaseless, unforgiving winter.

And tonight, like every night, Velithor’s memories were intrusive things he had no control over, stampeding through his head with no rhyme or reason other than a common theme of failure. At some point he would get up to retrieve the aetherquartz necklace and the reserves that he carried into battle. He loathed using them like this, but it was the only way to welcome sleep. To pull as much of the shadow from his mind as he could… silence the voices that cried out as if they were in this very room, hissing through the air like arrows fletched with guilt and shame.

Coward, they whispered. Over and over.

But this time a short, clipped knocking at his door interrupted them.

His head swam with possibilities, none of them good and all of them urgent. ‘Enter,’ Velithor uttered hoarsely, standing from his bed in the roomy chamber. Long strands of brown hair clung to the sweat on his brow and he pulled them back behind his ears. He realised too late that he was still in silk-lined bedclothes. Regardless, Velithor struck an imposing figure, looking every bit the Lord Regent – tall and proud, his deep-set eyes imposing.

The door opened, revealing High Sentinel Lloryl. It was morning, then. Early, dark morning. He had assigned her second watch when she arrived here because she had the keenest eyes in the garrison, and would suffer no flights of fancy in the night like others might. But Lloryl was worried, her breath a ragged tattoo, straw-coloured hair a halo of flyaways. The stone floor of the bedchamber was a block of ice beneath Velithor’s feet, climbing up his legs. And the High Sentinel’s red cheeks told a tale of colder things outside.

‘Daemons on the mountain pass,’ Lloryl said. ‘Horrors of Tzeentch.’ He saw her short sword was already drawn.

Velithor nodded. Errant vanguards and roaming parties were not uncommon. Two volleys fired from Lloryl’s company of Sentinels was usually a sufficient response. Perhaps three, in this case, if it was Horrors they were dealing with.

‘Lord… their… their number is unclear. I think it prudent to send a rider up the mountain so that they might bring word to the lodge, should we require–’

‘No.’ Velithor cut her off, his tone firm and final. ‘Raise no alarm. We must be silent,’ he whispered, taking his own command. ‘Reveal only the presence of those already on the walls. But rouse every other arrow, take them to the gate. Hide them until it’s time. Make the daemons think they can take the gate with ease.’

Velithor grabbed a necklace with shards of aetherquartz hanging from it. He hung the aetherquartz around his neck, and closed his eyes, breathing deep. It was a sobering thing. Hope dwelled in its shards, and he would need all of it.

The Moon Gate and its garrisoned tower were far older than any aelf dwelling within them.

Originally built as a sentry among the glimmering peaks of the Lunarest Mountains to protect the bustling trade city of Calthrys on its other side, it now served as little more than a museum of the arcane and ancient – artefacts considered antiquated even by the Lumineth. Some of these were battle relics: skeletal weapons of the dead, Fyreslayer talismans, orruk cleavers – all things to be housed in a place rarely threatened. And now fully armed and armoured, Lord Regent Velithor Cellenya hurried through its rounded, curving hallways without so much as a glance towards its amulets and talismans, shields and swords, even a spear composed entirely of pale moonlight – they were forgotten treasures in a forgotten waypoint.

Two Wardens stood guard on either side, raising their spears in a silent salute as Velithor met them. The door opened onto a forked stone path: one side led down to the massive Moon Gate itself, and the other to the stables on the right. All was covered in snow, and the frigid mountain air hit Velithor’s lungs, killing off the last vestiges of his troubled sleep. It was a bitter cold. Like plunging beneath the ice of a frozen lake.

Velithor could feel his feet beginning to numb inside his boots as he took the right path. It was only a handful of paces from him now, the large stone oval of the building that was the stables, where a fire was kept, ever-burning, to stave off the cold. In addition to the Wardens and Sentinels that garrisoned the Moon Gate, Velithor had made only one request: that he be given a small company of Hurakan Windchargers, for their swift, sure-footed treerunner mounts could navigate the rocky terrain better than any steed in the stable, save for his own lightcourser, Nathyr. His wish had been granted, though begrudgingly. The Windchargers had made a request of their own, that their bedchamber be next to their steeds in the stables. Odd, but so were all the windfolk, and Velithor allowed it.

At the stable’s entrance, Velithor could see the stern, scarred and eternally frowning aelf who led the Windchargers. Fylael had them saddled atop their long-limbed treerunners and in formation. His gaze found Velithor. Fylael nodded and Velithor returned the gesture, grateful he could always count on Fylael’s vigilance. Something emerged from behind the ranks of Windchargers, larger even than their mounts: Nathyr, her paws treading the snowy mountain pass, deft and silent.

She stopped in front of him, her brown eyes staring out from silver-white fur. She bent her knees slightly and Velithor pulled himself into the saddle. Velithor pointed her to the gate and they made it over in a few bounding leaps, moonlight reflecting off her horns.

The Wardens readied spear and shield, arrayed to cover the full width of the gate. The Sentinels, with bows and full quivers, were along the walls above already, crouched and hurrying along in both directions on the battlements, silent shadows in the night.

He reached the front of the Wardens’ ranks and pointed his sword towards the massive wooden doors. Moonlight glinted off the silver blade. ‘Shield wall behind the gate,’ Velithor instructed, as quietly as he could. The aelves obeyed immediately, shields interlocked in an oblong phalanx. He looked for High Warden Thevyn and found her behind the Wardens, offering hushed guidance to the second and third ranks of spears. He hurried to her. ‘Take the reserves to the battlements. Swords, no spears. Keep them out of sight. Kill any who scale the walls, so that Lloryl’s Sentinels suffer no interruption.’

Thevyn nodded, turning back to her Wardens with quiet orders. Velithor urged Nathyr to the mountain wall east of the gate. They passed by the Wardens taking position nearby, and the Wardens turned to them, faces set in determination. They raised their spears as Nathyr galloped past them in the snow. Velithor looked to the walls and caught the sign from a crouching High Sentinel Lloryl, a raised fist: arrows ready. Readied and assembled with a speed that would impress Tyrion himself, even if Velithor did not.

There were actually two paths to continue up or down the mountain, though all but the aelves knew only one: the Moon Gate. But the Lumineth’s knowledge of these peaks was second to none. They had long ago carved a tunnel through the mountain itself, just east of the gate. The Eastern Door. It was no rough-hewn passage, but an intricate hall which exited on the other side of the gate and in the shadow of the mountain’s ridges, meaning it could be used to surprise a force from flank or rear.

Fylael had his Windchargers in line formation, two by two, ready to enter through the Eastern Door. Velithor took position at their head. Fylael had only to give a slight nod in Velithor’s direction and the Windchargers were in motion. Velithor knew the connection they had with their own mounts was similar to his own. Similar, he reflected, as Nathyr picked up on her master’s thoughts and leapt another full stride ahead of the treerunners. But not equal.

As they approached the Eastern Door, a portal carved out of the mountain rock itself, Velithor spoke the words of power and a shard of aetherquartz crystal grew brighter above the entranceway until the stone doors opened, slow and silent. The tunnel carved into the darkness beyond them was tall enough for riders, wide enough for two abreast. More shards lined the walls, providing dim illumination to see by. Nathyr strode inside. The tunnel went on long enough that you couldn’t see the light at the other end for a while. And when Velithor did, it led to a rocky outcrop, the entrance covered by a winding path that snaked its way through the mountain on this side of the pass, so that their passage would be hidden from view.

Nathyr traversed the path outside the opening as easily as even ground. The light of the moon was as close to daylight as they would get.

And Velithor could hear them, now.

The cacophony of snarls and the sickening sound of tearing flesh – or its daemonic equivalent – was horrible enough on its own, but the throaty chanting of the Tzeentchian Horrors was a sound one could never get used to. It was as if they were bringing forth some grave spell known only to their twisted god. The one benefit to it all, of course, was that it gave away their position above the outcrop that shielded Velithor and the Windchargers from view. They were now to the rear of the daemonic force, from the sound of it.

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