Lief felt Prin’s gentle touch on his shoulder. “Where are you going now, Lief?” he heard her ask.
Lief looked across the bridge to where the stream continued through rustling trees, and on to where the first rays of the sun glinted on broader water: the distant river that would take them to the wide sea and the forbidden place that was their next goal.
“I must not tell you, Prin,” he said softly. “But it is a long way from here.”
“And why are you going? And why so soon?” she persisted, for the moment, in her distress, becoming again that more childish Prin he remembered from the time when they first met.
“Because I must,” Lief said. “And because there is no time to waste. We must finish our journey as quickly as we can, now. There are people at home who are — waiting.”
And as he turned to meet Prin’s eyes, to say the hardest farewell of all, he prayed that the wait would not be too long.
This book has been compiled in secret. If the work had been discovered by any authority, I, its author, would have paid with my life. Or so I believe.
The risk was worth taking. Forces are working in Deltora to suppress the facts of our past as well as those of our present. Lies are everywhere. King Alton believes that the kingdom is thriving. He thinks that if monstrous perils once existed in far-flung corners, they exist no longer.
I know this is false. Because I, who once wore the silken gloves and velvet tunic of a palace librarian, now scavenge for food in the gutters of Del. I now know what the common people know, and more. I could never have imagined such a future for myself. But I regret nothing.
Perhaps I woul have fled from the palace if the king’s chief advisor, Prandine, had not ordered me to burn The Deltora Annals. The threatened destruction of the Annals, that great, vivid picture of Deltora over the ages, was more than I could bear. And so it was that while pretending to obey Prandine’s order, I saved the Annals and myself.
This book contains material drawn from The Deltora Annals as well as new information I have gained in the past few years. It describes many of the dreadful, mysterious beings that haunt this land. Some of these creatures are as evil and unnatural as their master in the Shadowlands. Others are native to Deltora. All grow stronger every day. Yet the king does nothing to offer his people protection. They hate him for it. But why should he help, since he does not know the monsters exist? None of them are spoken of in the palace except as beasts of legend, dangers of the past.
Books such as this are needed to correct the lies that have become official truth. The people are too busy scraping a living to write down what they know. Writing, in fact, seems almost to have disappeared among them. I fear that lies may one day become the only “facts” available to students, unless people like me act to prevent it.
What the future holds for us, and for Deltora, I cannot say. But when my hopes dim, I take heart in remembering another thing I did before I left the palace. It concerns yet another book — The Belt of Deltora. It is simply written, but full of wisdom. From the day I first found it in the library, I believed that it was of vital importance, and that it contained the keys to Deltora’s future, as well as its past. I kept it hidden, for I knew that if Prandine saw it, it would quietly disappear. I had planned to take it with me, but at the last moment something moved me to change my mind. I hid it, instead, in a dim corner where it would only be discovered by an eager searcher.
I cling to the hope that one day Prince Endon might find it. Even Endon’s friend, young Jarred, might do so, for though Jarred has no great love of books, his wits are keen. He may remember the library if one day he is in urgent need of knowledge. I know in my heart that if Deltora has a future, it lies with these young ones. It would be my joy to know that in some small way I have helped their cause. In faith —
Josef
Writing in the city of Del in the 35th year of the reign of King Alton.
The giant toad Gellick rules in Dread Mountain. The idea is shocking to anyone who knows Deltoran history, but it is true.
The Mountain in Deltora’s northwest corner has always been the domain of the Dread Gnomes. Tales of their courage and fighting skill stud the pages of The Deltora Annals like gems from their own treasure hoard. But Dread Mountain is very near the Shadowlands border. For years the Gnomes have had to battle wave after wave of the Shadow Lord’s Guards and fighting beasts sent to enslave them.
Now the toad Gellick, crawling from its lair deep in the rocks further north, has persuaded the Gnomes to serve it in return for a powerful weapon. Poisonous slime oozes from its skin — a venom so strong that a single drop is deadly. With this on their arrows, the Gnomes can defeat any invader.
I fear they have paid a terrible price. The toad speaks soft words for now, perhaps, but it is hiding its true nature. The Annals call it a vile beast, greedy, cruel and swollen with conceit. I heard of the Gnomes’ plight this way:
I had sold a gold chain — my last valuable possession — to buy paper, paint, and food. I was sitting in the market, eating ravenously, for I was starving. A small brown hand seized my wrist. Startled, I looked up at a figure in a hooded cloak. It was a Dread Gnome, the first I had ever seen. “I can trust you,” she said. “You eat, and you are warm.” Naturally, I thought she was mad. I was to learn otherwise.
Her name was Sha-Ban. She had fled from Dread Mountain planning to beg the king’s help for her people. But after a single day in Del she knew her quest was hopeless. The king was shut away, out of her reach. As he was out of the reach of all of us.
When she had told me of Gellick she began to speak of her journey, and the terrible things she had seen. I thought she had drifted into a nightmarish fantasy, and hoped the two old fruit-sellers near us would not hear her and be terrified. Fool that I was! Sha-Ban was doomed. It did not suit the Enemy to have her news spread in Del. I went to buy more bread. When I returned, she was lying, strangled and icy cold, in a pile of rotten fruit. The fruit-sellers had vanished.
I confess with shame that I left the brave Gnome where she lay, and ran. I knew I was a hunted man, for what Sha-Ban knew, I now knew also. But I vowed that the news she had given her life to tell would not die with her.
Vraal are vicious, fighting beasts, bred in the Shadowlands. They are mentioned once in the last volume of The Deltora Annals. At that time, a Vraal had been seen in the foothills of Dread Mountain with a pod of Grey Guards.
The Guards had the beast on a chain attached to a metal ring fixed to its neck. It was snarling and clawing at them. It was about the size of a man, and every part of it, from slashing claws to lashing tail, was made for destruction.
According to Ranesh, Sha-Ban, and others who have heard Grey Guards talking, Vraal live only to fight and destroy, and are highly intelligent in the ways of battle, though in nothing else. They were bred in captivity, and though a few have escaped to roam wild in the Shadowlands, most are kept in cages beneath a place called the Shadow Arena. They are used, in the words of Guards, for “sport.” Prisoners are forced to fight them in the arena, for the entertainment of the crowd.