When Twins War: Book I

Chapter Six

Luillan, as always, was rummaging through scrolls and books, considering Tarkanyon's mission and the Twin Cities. He kept going through what he knew about the Twin Cities' history in his head. It was a fantastic story, but as usual it required careful study to decide which parts of it were true and which were only fable and legend. Then understanding if any of it meant anything for the present was the next step. Tarkanyon was better with that than him. It was important to the Outlanders that present events were properly correlated to their ancient texts, for they were seekers of the Wealth – and inevitably, this meant they were also seeking for signs that would point to the return of the Moncoin.

It had been many ages past, about one thousand and four hundred years (depending on most calendars) since the great battle that freed the Southlands from the dark menace of the Moncoin. But as prophecy foretold, a much more decisive battle was to take place in the future. The Southlands of Lexedore were expecting the Moncoin to return, one day, and with him the Wealth and the Genicoins. For their part, the Outlanders expected the Wealth or Genicoins to return first, which is why they spoke of being the Seekers of the Wealth.

But why or how the Moncoin would return was one of the things Luillan spent most of his life studying - but not nearly as much as trying to calculate why or where the Genicoins mysteriously vanished to (or if half of what history said about them was actually true). He had no solid conclusions or even workable theories.

The Moncoin was an ancient Genicoin who had discovered what was termed, in the common language, the Riches. The Riches were, as most manuscripts put it, a twisted form of the Wealth – magic, or the substance of magic, that the Genicoins had mastered. The nature of this magic was unknown to men and would always remain a secret of the Genicoins.

With the Riches the Moncoin released the Hircoi, an ancient evil, from its chains and gave it entrance into the world. The result of this was a war amongst the Genicoins that raged for generations. Eventually the Genicoins appeared in Lexedore as mysteriously as they disappeared after the war. They came to Lexedore for refuge, tired and almost beaten in their war. The Genicoins brought technology and progress to Lexedore. For generations they armed and prepared Lexedore against the Moncoin, whom they said would come to face them all. Soon enough he did. Many blamed the Genicoins for bringing their war with them.

It was not much time before the Hircoi, now no longer found in the essence of one creature but living in a mysterious way in the armies led by the Moncoin, defeated and destroyed the north of Lexedore, the kingdoms from over the Great Mountains. These kingdoms fell, one by one – some willingly, others after great battles. The Hircoi then came through the Great Passing and infiltrated the south. During this time the Genicoins were creating what were known as the Threyal - the Three Armies.

As legend told it, each of the Threyal had power over a particular part, or element, of the land. They were armies of Sea, Earth, and Sky. How the Genicoins 'created' (for those were the words used in the manuscripts) the Threyal had something to do with the Wealth. After the Genicoins disappeared so did the Threyal. It was believed that they fell asleep and would awaken at the return of the Wealth when the Genicoin kings would march with them to battle once again.

However, that prophecy had some strange twist to it. It was quite popular to think that the Genicoin kings would rule the Threyal when they march, except that some particular prophecies used the word 'king' instead of 'kings.' This made a lot of difference, and some of Luillan's favourite manuscripts used 'king.' Luillan was convinced that it was to be one person who would rule them. There was even one prophecy, from the scrolls of Termiun, that said "A kings, who the Wealth has come to; he will march with them, and face that darkness once again on the shore of darkness." The grammar was just too strange for it to really mean 'kings.' It must have meant only one.