Albishadewe, "Great White One"

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About Albishadewe, Great White One

Humans have nearly driven the unicorns of Lazaronia to extinction, mainly for the beauty and value of their silver ivory horns. But a power with an even more evil purpose is now determined to wipe them out and succeeds in killing Albishadewe’s parents, leaving him wondering if he is the last of his kind. While searching for other unicorns, he seeks refuge as a member of a pony pack, knowing he is safe in the open until his horn starts growing. Just as his itching forehead tells him that time has come, a young woman, accompanied by her unicorn-hunting mistress, suddenly confronts him in the Silver Forest of Argentsiana. Albishadewe knows he should flee. But there is something about Dahrya that makes him stay. She claims to be an ordinary woman—a mere servant—yet how come she can see him in the forest, where even sorcerers’ eyes see only shadows? Could she be Argentsiana, the lost blind Goddess of the Silver Forest? Albishadewe must unravel the mystery of who Dahrya is to save his land from the evil swamping it. But the knowledge brings him more grief than he can bear …

BOOK ONE: Chapter 1

The sound of slow, heavy footfalls approaching drowned the songs of forest birds. The hairs on Albishadewe’s neck and back lifted, making his skin twitch. He jerked up his head from the grass and dead leaves on which he was munching. He was alone. But he didn’t normally mind his parents moving out of sight. They were never far away for long. So why did he suddenly feel unsafe?

Instinctively readying himself for flight, Albishadewe flicked his ears to catch the sound better, and flared his nostrils for any whiff of danger.

A large animal, his ears told him—at least the size of one of his parents. Maybe larger, for his parents were almost as light-footed as the forest deer. And why would either Moonglow or Quicksilver make so much noise?

Then his flaring nostrils told him it was indeed one of his parents—his father, Quicksilver. His tensed muscles relaxed. Yet his hide still prickled, for the smell wasn’t right. Why did it contain overwhelming fear? Was Quicksilver hurt? Only injury would make him heedless of how much noise he made.

Moments later Albishadewe sensed other emotions: anger and grief. They swamped him with the force of a tsunami, leaving him shaken. He’d never felt his parents’ emotions in this way before. He’d never known he could. Unicorns mostly communicated in mental images. Whatever was going on?

Even as he wondered this, a filtered sunbeam struck silver fire from the approaching unicorn’s horn. Quicksilver stepped into view. His massive shoulders sagged; his head drooped, as did his tail and long, silky mane. Even the sixty-centimetre silver horn on his forehead seemed to slump. And yet he appeared to be unhurt.

They’ve killed your mother, Albishadewe, and hacked off her horn. I couldn’t do anything to stop them. She knew leaving the Silver Forest is dangerous. I can’t think what possessed her.

All this came to Albishadewe in stumbling, shocking mind-pictures. Clearly Quicksilver was too overcome to remember his offspring’s extreme youth, or he would have softened the graphic detail of his sendings. Barely weaned, Albishadewe was just beginning to understand there was danger for his kind. It came, he understood, solely from humans, who for centuries had slaughtered unicorns for the beauty and value of their silver-ivory horns. Only until he grew a horn would he be as safe as the wild ponies roaming Lazaronia’s grasslands. Then stepping outside the boundaries of the Silver Forest, even for a moment, could be fatal.

Quicksilver stumbled to his colt’s side.

I haven’t seen any other unicorns for ages, little one. You and I could be the last of our kind, he continued in bitter images.

Albishadewe pondered this, his mind still too numb to take in his motherless state. He once asked Moonglow why he never saw other unicorns. His mother replied that even a small unity of unicorns—if a foal and its parents could be called a unity—needed huge tracts of forest to provide enough to eat. The nearest neighbouring unity, she said, could therefore be miles away.

But if his father was right his species was doomed—had been doomed for ages.

* * *

With every passing day Albishadewe grew bigger and stronger in spite of mourning for Moonglow. However, in some ways he didn’t feel entirely motherless. To the little unicorn it was as though a spirit within the Silver Forest of Argentsiana sent him comfort and watched over him. Most creatures, humans included, believed the forest to be guarded by the lost, blind goddess for whom it had been named—a goddess who nearly two thousand years ago ruled Lazaronia as Queen Siana. Whatever it was that comforted him, it soon helped wear away the worst of his grief.

But Quicksilver never fully recovered from his mate’s untimely death. Albishadewe was forced to grow up in a hurry as he realised his father needed looking after more than he did. Only another desperate reminder from his foal that without him Albishadewe would be alone in the world forced Quicksilver to try pulling himself together. However, he wouldn’t eat any of the grass at the Silver Forest’s edge.

There’s not much of it and you need it more than I do, little one, because you’re still growing, his images told Albishadewe as he munched without interest on dead leaves.

Albishadewe gave a small, snorting sigh, but didn’t argue. At least his sire was eating again.

However, he soon found loss of appetite to be the least of his worries where Quicksilver was concerned.

Where are you going? he whinnied in alarm as one day Quicksilver simply turned from his side and trotted out of the forest.

Quicksilver halted, looking confused. He stared over the plains, ears pricked. Moonglow’s out there, Albishadewe. She’s calling me.

She can’t. She’s dead. Albishadewe trembled so much his images were nearly as confused as his sire’s.

Her spirit’s out there, calling me. She wants revenge.

But you don’t even know who killed her.

She says it was King Lazarone’s twin, Ignarius. She wants me to kill him.

Albishadewe’s hide prickled all over. You can’t kill the King’s brother! The royal family will kill you too.

Quicksilver’s nostrils flared. Ignarius is evil. It’s rumoured that two thousand years ago he was also twin to the Godking, Lazarone the First, who married the Goddess Lazaria. Ignarius was jealous of his brother and murdered him in the caves of Geheimberg, the Secret Mountain. As Albishadewe looked at him with a question in his eyes, Quicksilver continued, Geheimberg is Lazaronia’s highest peak. It gets its name from the spell of invisibility placed upon it by the Piksenvolk of Piksenville, which lies somewhere deep inside the mountain. The Sacred Mountain (for it’s sometimes called that too) then turned upon the murderer and sealed him in with a landslide at the cave’s entrance. Legend has it the Godking’s brother somehow reincarnated himself as the twin of our present King, Lazarone the Third. But to do that, Ignarius’s spirit must have found a way to escape the Voice of Judgement, which would definitely have consigned him to eternal non-existence for his crime.

The prickling in Albishadewe’s hide had strengthened with every image his sire sent. You mean the King’s brother is a sorcerer?

The most powerful sorcerer the land has known. Sorcerers aren’t necessarily evil, Albishadewe. The Piksenvolk, who are a race of mountain pixies, have magic powers—they can levitate, for instance—and they’re certainly not evil. But there’s no doubt Ignarius is. And he must be killed for the good of the whole land. It’s the least I can do for Moonglow. If I’d looked after her better—

In a rush of insight Albishadewe understood why Quicksilver was making no effort to get over his loss. You can’t blame yourself for what happened to my mother. She was a full-grown adult, not a helpless foal. Now please come back into the forest. If anything happens to you too I’ll be all on my own.

Quicksilver immediately obeyed. But it seemed to take him an enormous effort. And he wouldn’t stop gazing longingly over the plains as he had done ever since giving Albishadewe the news of Moonglow’s death. Albishadewe found keeping an eye on his sire so exhausting he finally fell asleep on his feet. When he awoke Quicksilver was nowhere to be seen.

Albishadewe searched and called for ages. In the past one call was enough to bring either parent to his side. But this time he received no answer. Clearly Quicksilver had obeyed his delusions and left the forest.

There was no help for it, Albishadewe told himself. He would have to leave the safety of the Silver Forest’s boundaries. And the world out there looked so huge. From the forest borders the plains seemed to go on forever. He had never caught as much as a glimpse of the mountain range where Geheimberg lay behind its spell of invisibility. His father said the range was at least as big as the Silver Forest. And there were other, ordinary forests as well.

But in which direction lay the dwelling called Castle Lazarone with its many pointed towers? According to Quicksilver, the sorcerer Ignarius lived there with his brother the King, Queen Esmeralda and the little Princess Esmé. If Quicksilver was set on killing the King’s brother he would surely have headed for the castle. He would lie in wait from a hiding place in sight of the castle gates until Ignarius came out alone.

Albishadewe sighed as he stared out over the plains. The last thing he wanted was to leave the safety of the Silver Forest. But he had to rescue Quicksilver from his own folly. And he didn’t sport even a budding horn. Surely that meant he’d be safe?

He gave another snorting sigh, gathered every atom of courage he possessed and rushed into the open. Almost immediately he felt the sun on his back. It was much hotter than when filtered through leaves. He wasn’t sure he liked it.

At the same moment it seemed that the forest’s silver canopy abruptly turned a textureless blue and rolled up and away. Confused, Albishadewe skittered to a halt. He blinked upwards. Of course! That blue wasn’t forest. It was sky. So that was how the sky looked without the forest. He’d never realised how far away it was. Even the few clouds flecking its surface looked miles above him.

He felt himself begin to shake. All his instincts shrieked at him to return to the protection of the Silver Forest.

Only the thought of the ignoble death awaiting Quicksilver should he succeed in killing the wizard Ignarius made Albishadewe force his legs back into a gallop. There was no time to waste. Judging from the angle of the sun, he’d been asleep in the forest for some hours. Would he be on time?

Chapter 2

Albishadewe galloped in the direction in which Quicksilver had been staring. It seemed as good a route to take as any.

The wind of his going flagged his long, silky mane out behind him. The breeze pouring over his body in a continuous stream felt most peculiar. It was as though he galloped in a dream. Indeed, he often dreamed of galloping with the wind like this. Perhaps he was dreaming. Except that, if he was, it wasn’t a dream but a nightmare. He’d love to wake up and find both himself and Quicksilver still safe in the forest.

Albishadewe knew he wasn’t dreaming when he began to tire. He’d cantered under the eaves of the forest boundary many times, just for the fun of the exercise. However, that wasn’t quite the same as a life-and-death gallop across the plains, he told himself. He simply couldn’t afford to stop or slow down to catch his breath.

He galloped on.

But it was no good. His immature and inadequately exercised muscles just couldn’t take it. If he carried on pushing himself like this he’d collapse. That wouldn’t help either Quicksilver or himself.

He drew to a halt, his sides heaving, his legs trembling. With the sound of his own hooves no longer pounding in his ears, he realised he could hear other hooves—from behind. He turned to look.

Coming towards him, moving in the same direction as himself, was a large pack of wild ponies. Their leader was a white mare—or what passed for white in wild pony herds. By her side frolicked a white foal. There were other white animals scattered through the pack, along with black ones, chestnuts, greys and piebalds.

If only he could join them! With animals similar to himself all around him he’d feel so much safer out in this high, wide world.

Critically he scanned the pack. Even the foals were more stockily built than he was. But surely he wouldn’t look too out-of-place among them? He’d need to dull his sparkling white coat, of course. However, there was an even bigger problem: would they accept him?

Albishadewe rolled on the ground where the grass grew sparsely. When he thought his coat had enough dust in it he scrambled to his feet and watched the herd until it was nearly past him. They didn’t even look at him. Then, with as little fuss as possible, he moved in with the stragglers. Still none of the ponies took any notice of him.

Now all he had to do was work his way to the middle of the pack. He’d stand out less there. But first he needed to know where they were headed. If they weren’t going near Castle Lazarone he’d have to leave them.

It didn’t take him long to work out that the ponies used a primitive form of communication that was a mixture of body language and voiced sounds. But he didn’t have time to learn it. A pity, because he’d rather not make it obvious he wasn’t one of their kind. However, it couldn’t be helped. He’d have to risk being noticed and possibly cast out of the pack.

Giving a mental sigh, Albishadewe sent his mind out seeking that of the pack’s leader. She snorted and reared in confusion at the unaccustomed interference. But in seconds Albishadewe had the information he wanted: the pack was indeed headed for Castle Lazarone. Apparently the grazing at the foot of Emerald Hill, on which Castle Lazarone was perched, hadn’t suffered as badly from the dry summer as the territory normally favoured by the pack.

He’d learned from his invasion of the leader’s mind that her name was Tyenna. He waited for her to halt the journey and try discovering what had upset her. But she didn’t. Clearly there were more differences between unicorns and horses than just communication methods and a horn. Perhaps it was just as well—for him, anyway.

Albishadewe lengthened his stride—so slightly that none of the ponies noticed his advance to the pack’s centre.

The first they saw of Castle Lazarone, hours later, was the top of the Tower of Kaleidoscopic Light—a strange, forbidding structure that was only one of the castle’s many pointed towers. The main outward difference between it and the others was that its roof consisted of eight wedge-shaped stained-glass windows. They were said to tell a story. Most people thought the story was about the Goddess Lazaria during her time as queen consort to the Godking Lazarone I, but even scholars couldn’t interpret the meaning of the pictures. The tower was also rumoured to be a place of great power.

The leading ponies crested the rise. The whole of Castle Lazarone and Emerald Hill came suddenly into view. Tyenna brought her pack to a halt. Albishadewe didn’t have to invade her mind to catch the horror that coursed through her at something she could now see. His heart sank and started pounding with dread.

Without knowing how he managed it, he made his way to the front of the pack. From there he saw all too clearly that his worst fears for Quicksilver were confirmed.

Two forms lay on the grass outside the castle’s wrought-iron gates. One was Quicksilver. There was no doubt that he was dead, for a hunter was sawing off his horn. The other was a man, about to be lifted onto an improvised stretcher by two other men. Albishadewe, though overcome with a rush of grief and anger, knew a moment of jubilation that Quicksilver had at least not lost his life for nothing.

Then another man, a replica of the one on the stretcher even down to his riding clothes, approached the stretcher. Shouting in what appeared to be a fit of grief-stricken rage, he waved the other men away. They immediately turned and scuttled into the castle gates, one of them leading a barebacked horse that had stood nearby. The man then shouted at the hunter who was removing Quicksilver’s horn. The hunter instantly rose and scurried after the first two men, his job only half-done.

The man at the stretcher stooped and touched the prostrate man’s head with both hands. It was only as he then raised them to his own head, and Albishadewe caught a flash of something silver, that the little unicorn realised the second man had taken from the first man’s head a low, lightweight crown. Clearly, then, the man on the stretcher wasn’t Ignarius but King Lazarone. And no king would willingly allow his symbol of sovereignty to be taken from him.

When the man now wearing the coronet covered the other man’s face with a large handkerchief, Albishadewe knew the King was dead.

Ignarius turned from the stretcher. He scanned his surroundings as though aware of eyes watching him. He looked straight at the pack of ponies and Albishadewe’s hide prickled all over with horror at the evil emanating from him.

I know you’re out there somewhere, puny white shadow, Ignarius’s voice said into Albishadewe’s mind, translating the little unicorn’s name into the common tongue. You think your sire killed the wrong man. He didn’t. Under my power, he killed as I commanded, believing it was I, Ignarius, who dared mount his back. In front of independent witnesses he threw the King to the ground and savaged him with both hooves and horn. This means I’ve all but wiped out your species now. I’ll get you one day, too. You will never fulfil the prophecy of Oracles concerning you.

Albishadewe pricked his ears. Prophecy? What prophecy? Why would a Chief Piksenlord who’d lived nearly two thousand years ago write a prophecy about him? But he kept the questions to himself. He wanted no truck with his parents’ murderer.

But Ignarius hadn’t finished. My brother tried to stop the hunting of unicorns for their horns, just as he outlawed the killing of dragons. The people will now see how wrong he was—that unicorns are vicious killers. But you’re little more than a helpless baby. If I don’t get you, a hunter’s arrow surely will. Consider yourself already dead.

With that, Ignarius turned back to the stretcher. He stood looking down at the dead man, his bowed shoulders suggesting he was trying to look as though he mourned. He didn’t lift his head until a group of people came hurrying through the castle gates and down the rest of the hill. A woman with a girl child at her side led them. Albishadewe didn’t need telling the two were Queen Esmeralda and her daughter. The Queen might be short and slightly plump, but she was every inch a queen, more regal than the comeliest of the ladies following at her heels, along with various officials and the men at whom Ignarius had shouted.

The little Princess Esmé broke away from her mother’s side. She rushed to the stretcher. Daddy! Daddy! They’ve killed my Daddy!

Her child’s treble, shrill with terror, made Albishadewe’s ears shrink.

Before Ignarius could stop her, she had snatched the covering from the dead King’s bloodied face. Ignarius pulled her away and stooped to take her in his arms. She resisted, beating her fists against his chest.

Princess! Princess! I am your daddy. The unicorn killed your Uncle Ignarius, not me. Ignarius had raised his voice to drown the child’s grief-stricken wails. Even from where he stood Albishadewe had no trouble hearing.

By this time Queen Esmeralda had reached the stretcher. With calm dignity she examined her husband’s dead face. Ignarius admitted defeat in his attempts to give his niece false comfort and rose to face the Queen.

Before he was upright, Esmeralda snatched the silver circlet from his head. How dare you steal my husband’s crown!

My love! My love! Calm down! You’ve been given a garbled story. It was my brother Ignarius who was killed. He asked for it. You know what he’s like. He spelled the unicorn into allowing him on its back. It was a silly dare.

The Queen held out the coronet. Her black eyes flashed. Then how do you explain the blood on this?

Ignarius extended his hands, palms up. Albishadewe could see the blood on them all too clearly. I touched him to see if he was alive. I tried to revive him. After all, he was my brother, whatever else he may have been. I must then have touched my crown.

The Queen brandished the coronet, upside down, in his face, forcing him to step back a pace. On the inside of it?

Ignarius looked at where she pointed and turned visibly pale. He stepped back another pace—and tripped over the end of the stretcher. He fell flat on his back, his legs straddling the stretcher inches from the King’s head. The Queen stood over him, still brandishing the silver circlet. Don’t you dare try stealing your brother’s throne again. Do you think I don’t know the difference between you and Lazarone by now? A woman always knows her own husband. If the husband is also a king and has a jealous identical twin, she makes doubly sure of it.

Ignarius tried to sit up but was stopped by the very real threat of