By Christopher Leeson
Epilogue
Epilogue
FROM DYAN'S JOURNAL
Triumphs pass, songs fade, good friends go their separate ways.
It was with heavy heart that I parted from my family on the wharf of Nawcant in the kingdom of Sulidir. Ceann, Gannon, and I had already agreed to journey inland, to a villa within a ride of three hours from the city of Tyary Graig and rejoined Lady Elekta. Ceann had previously let me know of her desire to leave the Fyana; I supposed that this was her first half-step in that direction.
Of the months since then there is little to tell.
Late spring yields to summer, and summer ultimately assumes the golden crown of autumn. Cefen M'Glywess, the Lady's husband, had established his family at a comfortable country house. Here his wife Elekta has been busy for months creating a household out of an empty hall. Understandably, she has not afforded me a great deal of time for the teaching of magic. I have books, but their turgid discourses have left me stultified and uninformed. I have more time in idleness than in study. And idleness, alas, allows one to contemplate the depth and breadth of his regrets.
When I think about Harouck, I seethe. Is he the disease, or is he only the outward sign of a much deeper affliction? Cawdour had been frank in his observation that the landed lords have been dwindling in both wealth and influence since well before the rise of the usurper. Likewise, the patriotic yeoman have lost their own status and become debt-ridden, dispossessed, and -- in many cases -- shiftless.
It is to the energetic merchants and the burgers that a ruler looks to for support in these decadent days. At the heart of the old warrior class is tradition, but among these new men tradition is oftentimes a very bad fit. The old social order relegated them to the rear of the room, and they, perhaps, do not remember their former status kindly.
Those whom Cawdour called “new men” are not all bad, of course. The M'Glywesses and the Oc'Raighnes, in fact, number among them. Had I been brought up in the old days I never could have won my knightly spurs. But where the old aristocracy was dedicated to the commonweal with an intensity that was akin to religion, these new-made men too often look at government as means to a personal end. They flatter and bribe to win support for their, oftentimes, selfish aims, and those in power do their best to please them.
The world is in a flux of change, some say, but change has assailed the warrior class like a brutal giant. There was a time when the soldier quested far and made new discoveries; today it is the merchant, the trader, the sea captain. The old aristocracy, though they bear the same titles, are not like their ancestors. What has the scions of old nobility done lately to give credit to their progenitors? I think of our king, Cathmor, and recognize how far the demoralization has spread.
I, too, have passed my first summer of my new life in slothful melancholy. If Chancellor Harouck typifies our future, I will live and I will die in opposition to such man and such a future. Is there hope? Sometimes a bush that is sheared off by the axe can return from its deep roots. Can it be that way, too, with the stout oak which is men's traditions? If men of worthy motives return to the fight, the battle, ultimately, may still be lost, but is not the worth of a man found in what he attempts, not in what Fate allows him to accomplish? Failure is the most usual result of all endeavors. It is easy to do evil; to attain a worthy cause and win immortal fame is difficult.
These thoughts are not light to bear and they wear me down. I will speak of other matters.
