INTERLUDE:
Thousands of norns lay in exhausted heaps throughout the forest. The strain of maintaining the emotions of both Gellan Ware and Queen Sefwyn had tested them to their limits. The next part of the herd’s plan would be even worse. Kafláen did not want to think about that reality at this moment.
Kafláen allowed the glow from a hard-fought victory to course through his fatigued mind. He had won! The Queen of Nidafall had agreed to help the humans reopen Selinger’s gold mines.
On one of his early trips to Bregoth as a Journeyman, Gellan Ware had encountered Bodelic. It was then that he had the idea to bring dwarvish Miners to Selinger. Young Journeyman Ware, however, had been certain no human Lord would ever deal with a Dwarf.
Kafláen had studied Gellan’s mind on his many trips in the wilderness, watching as he grew in power and experience. As Gellan immersed himself ever more deeply into the circles of commerce, the farther he removed himself from the feelings of his youth. He learned that the decisions of rulers had less to do with sentiment than they did with self-interest
Kafláen had waited to implement his plan until Gellan had gained enough position and influence to persuade the Lord of his House to support such a risky venture. Then Kafláen had pushed the Trader toward it by heightening his admiration for Bodelic and strengthening his lust for status.
The first part had been easy. Once set upon a course, humans often followed it without any further questions, buttressing their past emotions and decisions with rationalizations. Such subjects had little need of magical reinforcement. Queen Sefwyn had been another case entirely.
Nudging the Queen to agree to Gellan’s plan, proved to be fairly easy. She had long believed isolation from humans harmed her people. Queen Sefwyn, however, held the egocentric belief that if the Segmentalists succeeded in taking Nidafall, the last hope of her people would be lost. She also struggled to suppress her very justified fear of assassination.
Keeping her on course, however, had taken constant emotional readjustment. If her fear of assassination dipped too low, Sefwyn would not even consider involving her people with humans because the risks to Nidafall’s continued existence were too high. If they increased her fear of the Segmentalists too much, her assassination fear increased, and she would focus on maintaining the existence of a Ruling Queen to the exclusion of everything else. Depress her fear of the Segmentalists too far, and her imperative to secure her throne faded away.
That dynamic only included her fears. There were similar relationships between her ego and her hopes for the future. The constant shifts of all these elements complicated matters, as different events impacted her. After the attack by the fyglóra, Sefwyn’s emotional state had been such a conflicting mass of signals that Kafláen had feared the Queen would collapse into a catatonic heap. The plan would then fail because the hûrd had not had opportunity to study the mind of Sefwyn’s likely successors.
Kafláen glanced to his right where an exhausted Hoëlwin struggled to prop himself against an elenium tree’s massive trunk.
“Have faith, Hoëlwin. You have done well.”
Hoëlwin answered, “Thank you. I have never been so tired in all my life.” Hesitation crept into his tone as he asked, “I wonder if our effort was worth it.”
Kafláen restrained his annoyance. He simply raised an eyebrow.
“We barely had the strength to handle the Queen. What makes you believe we can manipulate even more minds for the next part of the plan?”
“You are as much a part of the hûrd as I. You know what we intend to do.”
“Perhaps. Yet, I do not believe. Belief and knowledge are two different things.”
Kafláen inclined his head. “I had not realized how difficult this task would be. Selinger is an even greater distance, and the next part of the plan requires us to influence even more minds.”
The elder norn soothed, “I shall transport myself to a small forest near to the City. There are just enough mature elenium trees to receive the spell. With a select group of powerful norns, we can focus the hûrd’s effort. The strain will not be so great.”
“I know the collective wisdom of the hûrd. Yet, I have not experienced such magic.”
“And thus you do not believe. How have you come to have so little faith in the hûrd?”
“Because, I have had a subjective experience which forces me to doubt its wisdom.”
“You have learned to question, Hoëlwin. Do not worry. We all question. In this case, your doubt is misplaced. Nevertheless, you have learned a very important lesson. The hûrd is not omniscient. It is the collective experience of all who join linked with the memories stored in the grove. Even that vast storehouse of experience can confront unexpected results.”
“I am afraid.”
“Yes—I perceive your fear. Be comforted. Had you been human, you would have attempted to hide your fear to avoid the consequences of shame and losing your place in the tribe. Be glad you are a norn. A norn cannot hide what he is and therefore has no false image to maintain. Thus you can gain the aid of the hûrd and your growth is not stunted by your need for status.”
“Fear is a strange emotion. And uncomfortable.”
“Yes, it is. You have not confronted it before because there is little outside your experience after you have merged with the hûrd.”
“’Tis different to see it in memory and experience it for yourself. Does that difference ever cause you to doubt what the hûrd decides?”
“It can. Usually such doubt is misguided.”
“What happens when it is not?”
“Then the hûrd has made a mistake. Those who have genuine doubts must explore them, so that if the hûrd is indeed in error, a solution is then ready at hand.”
Aware that the plan the hûrd now followed had largely come from the learning of Kafláen, Hoëlwin said, “Then I will not upset you if I say that the Queen’s unexpected desire to help the humans rebuild their empire worries me to no end. Never did we expect such a result.”
“No, we did not. Yet, how can it matter? Horgeond is in chaos. Selinger will fall. What then will they have to build upon? Rubble?”
“The young human. Calidon. He worries me. He nearly caused our plans to go awry in Horgeond....”
“And, he helped them when they seemed ready to collapse in Nidafall.”
“Exactly, mentor. He is a factor we cannot predict. Who knows what havoc his influence will wreak in Selinger?”
“I believe you overestimate his significance. He is like every other human. He is ruled by his desire for status and for the females of his kind.”
“We have not studied him and do not know how to manipulate him. He has played an unforeseen role two times in a row. Does that fact not worry you?”
“And both times we have succeeded. He is not truly unexpected. If you understand humans, his actions are not strange. We just could not predict which human, out of thousands, would act in his fashion.”
Hoëlwin’s face expressed his doubt once more. Kafláen said, “Do not worry, young one. We shall go to my lake and we shall watch him, if he worries you so. You shall see he is not important.”
Grim Fōestan listened to Hoëlwin express his doubts without uttering a word. He, too, had his reservations. Unlike Hoëlwin, however, he was just as old and experienced as Kafláen, and did not share his surety. He feared that Kafláen’s eons-long lust to destroy humanity clouded his judgment. Fōestan decided he, too, would watch the young human.
He doubted, however, that he would agree with Kafláen’s conclusions.