Runescape, p.1
RuneScape, page 1
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Leave us a Review
Copyright
Dedication
Part I: The Founding
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Part II: The War
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Part III: The Tower
Twenty-Two
Twenty-Three
Twenty-Four
Twenty-Five
Twenty-Six
Twenty-Seven
Twenty-Eight
Twenty-Nine
Thirty
Thirty-One
Thirty-Two
Thirty-Three
Thirty-Four
Acknowledgments
About the Author
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RUNESCAPE: THE GIFT OF GUTHIX
Print edition ISBN: 9781803365213
Electronic edition ISBN: 9781803369235
Published by Titan Books
A division of Titan Publishing Group Ltd
144 Southwark Street, London SE1 0UP
www.titanbooks.com
First edition: May 2024
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1
This is a work of fiction. Names, places and incidents are either products of the authors’ imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead (except for satirical purposes), is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2024 Jagex Ltd.
Published by Titan Books under licence from Jagex Ltd. © Jagex Ltd. JAGEX®, the “X” logo, RuneScape®, Old School RuneScape® and Guthix are registered and/or unregistered trade marks of Jagex Ltd in the United Kingdom, European Union, United States and other countries.
Cover illustration: Mark Montague and Terence Abbott.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
To all the ones who never stop.
PART I
THE FOUNDING
I should have seen this as a sign of things to come, but I hoped that in free rein they might see the harmful impact for themselves, and gain enlightenment from their destructive impulses.
—THE WORDS OF GUTHIX
ONE
THE SEVENTH YEAR OF THE REIGN OF LORD RADDALLIN OF THE DONBLAS TRIBE
THE SEVENTH DAY OF THE MONTH OF SEPTOBER
FREMENNIK PROVINCE
Ilme came to the shore of the Wolf Clan’s summer encampment on a cold tide, two lies in her mouth and a gifted green cloak wrapped around her shoulders.
Master Endel regarded her with a scrutiny so thorough that panic curled in Ilme’s stomach—he had surely figured her out. But he only refastened the silver brooch, shaped like a crescent moon, to sit higher on her shoulder and brushed something off the fabric there. He gestured at her long brown braid.
“Do something about your hair,” he said, almost pleading. “Look less… guileless. We’re aiming for ‘aloof’. For… ‘youthful wisdom’.”
Ilme undid the plait and cast a sideways glance at Endel’s apprentice, Azris, her dark hair piled in a knot of loops at the crown of her head. Ilme thought of Endel’s second apprentice, a girl called Eritona, her rows of braids sleek against her elegant head.
Eritona was not here as she had fallen ill and remained behind—but everyone knew the Moon Clan travelled in groups of three and no one would accept them as mages from the Lunar Isle if they didn’t. So Master Endel had needed a replacement and Ilme, guileless and unwise, would have to suit.
She raked her fingers through her brown hair and felt worry twist her stomach again. Eritona had fallen ill at the very time Ilme needed to go north. Someone might have poisoned her. Someone might have made certain Ilme was the one who followed Master Endel north, and if that came out—
“Fortunately,” Master Endel said, as the ship swayed beneath them, “my understanding of the Fremennik suggests that the jarl will leave you be. They don’t value youth and he will assume your magical aptitude makes you untrustworthy.”
Azris cast a sceptical glance at Ilme. “Master, won’t that mean he’ll assume you’re untrustworthy?”
Master Endel waved this away. “I don’t intend to become the jarl’s confidante—only to solve a mutual problem.”
“I still don’t understand how having a rune cache is a problem.”
“Because you are not Fremennik. And you are not of the Moon Clan, but since here you are supposed to be an initiate of the Moon Clan—” here he gestured to himself, to his own borrowed green robes, “—you should just accept that it’s the case.”
This was the first lie: they were not from the Moon Clan, far up across the Northern Sea, where those mages hid themselves. The Moon Clan didn’t believe in runes. Rune magic was what had caused all the world’s problems before—putting magic in the hands of anyone who could grasp it, regardless of their worth. If you were pure-minded and dedicated, then magic would come to you just as it did for the Moon Clan. Magic they did not teach to outsiders. Not willingly anyway.
But the Fremennik were the Moon Clan’s warrior cousins, in a way, and when there was a question of magic, the Moon Clan were the ones they would naturally reach out to—not the upstart court of a warlord of the south. So when Master Endel heard the rumours of rune essence found in the far north, this had been the plan he’d settled on.
“Are there male mages among the Moon Clan?” Ilme asked, trying to twist her hair up like Azris’s. “I heard they’re all women.”
“I heard they’re all demon-worshippers,” Azris chimed in.
Master Endel sighed. He was a small man, narrow-shouldered and trim-bearded, but what he lacked in physical presence he made up for in wit and wisdom. “Azris, if you are going to become a wizard, you are going to have to be less credulous. The Moon Clan are not demon-worshippers. They are Guthixians. More or less,” he added.
Master Endel, like most of the wizards Ilme had met including Azris, knew the names of spells and their methods of casting, the lore of the days before the God Wars shattered everything humanity knew. Like some, he had access to the stores of ancient runes, cached or collected, from which powerful magics could be formed.
But in his youth Endel had travelled to the Lunar Isle, the solitary refuge of the Moon Clan mages. He had slipped past the Moon Clan’s guards, and had gone down into their sacred rune essence mine—too holy to touch—and come out with rune essence and a scar in his ribs. He found a way to shape that essence into runes—daring strange and ephemeral plumes of elemental power to force them into shape—and travelled far and wide to scrape together more remnants of essence.
But no one, not even the fabled mages of the Moon Clan, were like the wizards of old, shaping runes of power and combining the gleaming stones into spells at a whim. The last time Endel had done anything extraordinary had been a terrific burst of flame that he’d spent a fistful of fire runes to create, which had sealed the Donblas Tribe’s success against the Caracalli in the earliest days of their campaign. Ilme had been eight when that had happened.
“The Fremennik as a rule do not work magic,” Master Endel said, as the sailors started loading things into the boat meant to ferry them to shore. “They don’t understand it. They fear it. So, if the rumours of the cache in the mountains are true, they will want to be rid of it. We’re going to solve their problem for them, and the jarl can pretend it was all his own plan. You are to embody an initiate of the Moon Clan: polished. Superior. Distant. Presence is a great magic. Both of you, remember what we’re doing here is of the utmost importance. If they have found a cache of runes, or even rune essence from the ages before, that will greatly benefit Lord Raddallin and thereby each of us. Ilme, leave the bags!”
“Yes, Master Endel,” Ilme said, taking off the pack she’d slung across her narrow chest, navigating around the half-pinned knot of her hair. She did not, however put back her scribe’s kit. That would not leave her side. She was careful, but it would only take one slip for the second lie to come out, and that would be very, very bad.
The sailors called that the boat was ready, and Master Endel gave the two young women one more assessment. “Azris, stop looking like you’ve smelt something unpleasant. Ilme, just… put the braid back. Come on.”
Ilme climbed down the side of the ship, settl ing in beside Azris on the leaky boat, and looked out across the last stretch of water. A great longhouse stood on the ridge overlooking the wide pebbled beach, the most prominent building in this seasonal village. But even that was built of skins and timber and slabs of peat. A dozen smaller structures surrounded it, like a gaggle of ducklings, but only the longhouse poured cook-smoke up into the cloudy air.
Below the longhouse the Fremennik had gathered on the beach itself, weapons in hand, their agitation and wariness so intense it seemed to stir the choppy waves between the little boat and the shore. Longships rested to the left of her, sleek bulks of wood ready to launch into attack. In their little boat, one sailor rowed and one waved a green cloth, like a flag of peace. This didn’t diminish the Fremennik’s wariness—Ilme wondered if they’d been tricked by false signs before.
Ilme made herself take a deep breath.
“I hear they sacrifice people,” Azris whispered to her, eyes on the Fremennik. “Put them on the fire and roast them alive. For demons. Maybe the Moon Clan don’t worship demons, but the Fremennik do. Everyone knows that.”
Ilme had heard this as well, but hoped it was a less credible rumour than the cache. “Master Endel said they were Guthixians,” Ilme whispered back. “Why would Guthixians roast people?”
Azris gave Ilme’s re-plaited braid a rough tug. “They’re maniacs. Who knows why they do anything?”
That was nonsense—Ilme was only sixteen and there was a lot she hadn’t seen and didn’t know, but if there was one thing she understood completely it was that people always had reasons for what they did. They might be foolish reasons, they might be dangerous reasons, and they might be reasons that people themselves didn’t know outright—but they were there. You could predict most things, if you listened and watched and uncovered the reasons.
Master Endel sat at the prow of the boat—polished, superior, and distant. When the boat hit the shore, he didn’t wait, but began walking up the beach toward the jarl. Azris climbed out after him, and Ilme followed, splashing through the icy shallows. By the time she’d made her way up the sliding stones of the beach, wet and stumbling, there was no hope of her embodying anything so fine as a mage of the Lunar Isle.
But Master Endel had already begun the lie to great effect. He approached the warriors on the beach, as unconcerned and steady as a ship cutting through calm water.
“I have come from across the Northern Sea to seek the counsel of Jarl Viljar,” he announced. “There is a disturbance in the magic of Gielinor and the Moon Clan wishes to resolve it to maintain the safety of all.”
The warriors glanced sideways at a pair of men—both young, both stern-faced, the same heavy brows, the same sharp noses. Brothers, Ilme thought. One was whip thin, with a pale beard and dark, sharp eyes. He wore a tunic embroidered with ferocious, beastly faces and a pectoral shaped like a sharp-toothed, horned face framed by axes. Over his shoulders he wore a wolf pelt, the hood fashioned so the wolf’s snout stuck out over his forehead, and summoning pouches hung around his waist. The other was dark-haired, his shaggy mane of brown hair flowing into his beard and down his furry shoulders. Two torques of braided silver were stacked on his thick neck, and he wore a helmet figured to look like a sneering, horned demon.
Ilme sucked in a breath.
“I might know what you speak of,” the dark-haired man said, not looking away from Master Endel. “What business is it of the Moon Clan?”
“Are we not the guardians of magic in this world?” Master Endel asked. “As much as I would never claim an axe, I don’t believe you wish to claim the runes. Will you take me to the jarl?”
The Fremennik muttered at this, and the pale-haired man made a sharp gesture. The dark-haired one spared the briefest of glances at Azris and Ilme, arranged on either side of Master Endel as they had practised, before saying, “We are not meant to interfere with the gods or their doings. Guthix has given us all we need to master our fates.”
“Which is why he has sent us to root out your conundrum,” Master Endel said. “Take me to your father.”
It was a neat trick, Ilme thought, as the men both paused, gazes flicking away from Master Endel. Who else could this pair be but the jarl’s sons, looking so alike and speaking with such authority? But they clearly hadn’t expected it to be so obvious; maybe they forgot how much they looked alike when one was light and one was dark. Now, Endel seemed far more a master of his art.
“I am Reigo Viljarsson,” the dark-haired man said. “This is my brother, Ott. If you are going to claim hospitality for the Moon Clan, then you will follow me and observe the rites.”
This was not in Master Endel’s plans—the hope was that they would recover the cache and leave as quickly as possible, no more than a day later, not lingering to let the Wolf Clan poke at their lie. But Master Endel was a quick-thinker, and he wanted the rune cache.
“Of course,” he said. “I have seen the paths and I forget to walk them. Lead on.”
The pale man started to object, but his brother shot him a look of irritation, and gestured for two warriors to flank Master Endel and guide him up the beach.
“Demon rites,” Azris whispered. Ilme watched Reigo and his ferocious helm lead the way up to the great longhouse.
The warriors fell in, and no one said what Ilme and Azris should do. No one had even acknowledged them. Ilme looked back at their abandoned luggage on the shoreline.
“Did you have a dream about this?” a voice asked. “Is that why you came?”
Ilme looked back and saw that one person hadn’t followed—a boy with yellow hair covering his ears, freckles, and dark, piercing eyes. He couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen, all elbows and angles and potential.
Azris lifted her chin in a fine mimicry of Master Endel. “We don’t discuss the visions.”
“We didn’t,” Ilme said, remembering the fine points of the lie. “We haven’t taken our final vows.” Was that right? Did Moon Clan mages take vows? Tests?
Azris shot her a dark look, as if Ilme had insulted her. “Anyway, it’s not your business, boy. Take the bags.”
The boy snorted. “Take them yourself, apprentice.”
Ilme stepped between them. “I’m Ilme. This is Azris. What’s your name?”
That question made a dark cloud pass over the boy’s face. “Gunnar Viljarsson.”
“You’re the jarl’s son?” Azris asked.
There was no hiding the scepticism in her tone, and his posture shifted into a mimicry of his brothers’. “He’s got three of us. Carry your own bags.”
“Well met,” Ilme said, giving him a courteous bow, and the boy relaxed a little. “Do you know where we’re meant to go now? Do we follow Master Endel?”
Gunnar frowned. “What else would you do?”
Ilme shrugged, nodding back at their supplies. “Put the bags somewhere. Prepare the beds. Like you said, we’re apprentices.”
“But you’re guests first,” Gunnar said. “What do you do to seal the guest rites?” He eyed them both. “Is it true you poison visitors and make them tell you all their secrets, and only let them stay if they survive?”
“What?” Azris cried. “That’s absurd.”
He shrugged. “It’s what they say.”
“We just don’t want to do anything wrong,” Ilme said, thinking she ought to avoid the Lunar Isle if even a breath of that were true. “It would reflect poorly on our master and insult your father.” She thought of his brothers’ temper, the boy’s bluster. “And we’d get in trouble,” she added, a gamble.
It paid off. Gunnar, clearly used to being overlooked until he made a mistake, made a face. “I can’t believe you came all this way and don’t even know how to do the guest rites. Come on. Bring your bags up to the longhouse and someone will put them in a tent.”
“Can you even imagine that little twig being a jarl’s son?” Azris whispered as Ilme picked up the bags. “He doesn’t look the part at all.”
Not yet, Ilme thought. But that was Azris—she saw the surface of the water and never wondered what was churning beneath it. The moment and not what followed after it. Gunnar was only a boy, and so clearly through with being a boy. That was dangerous—someone could use that.
