The Royal Thief

Chapter Fifty-seven: To Be a Guardian part 2

A double-update week! Whoah!

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The Artifacts were legends. Fairy tales. Myths.

The Black Knight's sword, the king-killer, or the Pirate's fabled compass-- stories told to children as they were tucked into bed, or before cozy fires on Midwinter night. They were not real. They did not exist. They were not locked in a secret room at the very back of the castle's dungeons, lying on velvet cushions beneath glass cases that gleamed in the sparse light. 

Except, of course, they were.

"I expect you're familiar with the stories?" Tobias asked, clasping his hands behind his back. He wasn't looking at the cases, he was looking at me. Of course, he'd had years of knowing the Artifacts were real, years to become accustomed to this-- to entering the vault and seeing the most powerful weapons of the continent laid out like jewels in a noble store, all for the taking-- for the right price. 

I didn't trust myself to speak, so I only nodded. The floor was unsteady beneath my feet; I almost wondered if the room was moving. It wasn't. My head was whirling.

"Then let me fill you in on the history." His voice was even and composed, but he was still looking at me with something between pride and eagerness. "The Artifacts all came into being at different times and in different ways within a period of nearly fifty years, in the early age of the Guardians. They became well-known parts of Guardian lore, and back then no one would have passed they off as mere stories. However, not long after the Guardians came into existence, Englescroft began to reshape itself into the nation we know today, and by the time the Artifacts became common knowledge, they had begun their centuries-long crusade against Solangia-- or rather, for a bigger Englescroft.

Under the guidance of the Guardians, Solangia had expanded into land Englescroft had previously claimed. They druids-- then the leaders of the nation, the equivalent of the Guardians-- decided on the idea that Englians like Lord Iso have held close to heart ever since: destroy the Guardians, destroy Solangia. An apt observation that we have never taken lightly."

I knew this part. Caer had taught me, if not in so many words, how the Englians felt about Guardians standing in their way, and Iso himself had taught me something about it too. They needed the Guardians on their side, or they needed to somehow neutralize them.

Tobias stepped down the aisle between the cases, the hem of his robe snaking after him. He hardly spared a glance for the legends arrayed on either side of him. He walked like a king down here. This was his kingdom.

Lingering in front of one case, he brushed its top gently with one hand, and continued. "So it was then that the kings and queens of Solangia, to prevent the Englians, or anyone else, from being able to counter the Guardians, began to spread rumors. They let it be known that Guardians could only be killed by being stabbed through their Sign, or that Assassins could kill with a single touch-- almost any false myth about Guardians that you could think of originated in that time. Most of these myths are known today as only stories. But the irony is that the greatest rumor, that the Artifacts are only stories, is still believed to be true."

"That's when they started restricting information, isn't it?" I dared a single step deeper into the vault.

"That's when it started, yes. It took much longer than the rumors did, of course. The false information took hold quickly. Weeding out the truth took centuries. But in the end, hardly anyone outside of Solangia could tell you anything more than the most basic facts about Guardians, and even Solangians don't know... many things."

I thought of my first meeting with Iso, in the narrow corridor outside the noble hall, and his many questions, his eagerness for answers. He'd said it himself-- "We know so little about the guardians in Englescroft."