Rhuna- Black City

  Cover by Susanne Holm Concept Design SHCD@gmx.de

  Rhuna: Black City

  Amazon Kindle Edition

  Copyright © 2019 Barbara Underwood

  Barbara Underwood asserts the moral rights to be identified as the author of this work.

  While some of the events are based loosely on historical incidents, this novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters, businesses, organisations and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination, or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author.

  Table of Contents

  The Main Characters

  Introduction

  Rhuna: Black City

  About the Author

  More Books by the Author

  The main characters

  Rhuna, Keeper of Wisdom

  Aradin, Keeper of Justice – Rhuna’s current husband

  Shandi – daughter of Rhuna and Aradin with the ability to foresee the future

  Kiana – Rhuna’s mother

  Lozira, Melody of the Dawn – Rhuna’s adult daughter from her first marriage

  Goram, Beacon of the Night – Lozira’s husband, a renegade Atlan

  Damell, Avenger of Justice – Rhuna’s father, once believed to be dead

  Tozar, Harbinger of Solace – Rhuna’s first husband

  Mohandu, Charmer of Snakes – a friend and former follower of the Dark Master

  Yarqi, Seeker of Knowledge – a friend and former follower of the Dark Master

  Panapu – a big, strong man, and former soldier in Safu, the Land of the Pyramids

  Goll – an albino man, a scribe of the League of Record-Keeping Masters

  The Atlan Representatives:

  Protector of Remembrance – the most senior Atlan man with white hair

  Stillness of the Lake – an older woman with Atlan knowledge and skills

  Preserver of Faith – a younger woman with enigmatic deep voice

  Greeter of Friends – a younger man with language skills

  Introduction

  Rhuna has journeyed across many lands with her family and friends in their united quest to thwart the Dark Master and his destructive activities. Once a brilliant Atlan Master with exceptional skills and powers, his rebellion against the Atlan Empire and its peaceful society has caused great suffering for innocent people around the world. Rhuna’s inherent abilities expand and grow each time she strives to stop the Dark Master, but he remains elusive – this time escaping into a past time period by manipulating a time loop with a crystal portal.

  Rhuna is in the abode of the Masters of Ancient Wisdom who reside in the Land at the Top of the World when they discover the Dark Master’s latest strategy to mislead mankind onto the same selfish path he has chosen. The League of Record-Keeping Masters discover that their historic records have changed, and now describe a city that appeared suddenly in an empty region of the world.

  Rhuna and her family and friends finally discover that this city was established by the Dark Master in a time period eight hundred solar cycles in the past, and that every action he takes has profound and long-reaching consequences throughout the many generations to the present time. While historic texts continue to change as the Dark Master changes history, Rhuna’s party is trapped in the mountain-top abode by the cold season.

  Part One

  (The Abode of the Masters)

  Rhuna looked through the frosted window at the pale blue streak across the horizon that heralded a new day. She gingerly touched the thick glass with her forefinger and instantly recoiled from the menacing cold that had trapped her in the lofty mountain abode of the Masters of Ancient Wisdom. Once again she admired the sanctuary the Masters had constructed on the side of the steep rocky peaks, blending wooden structures with rocky alcoves and tunnels in which Masters and peasant workers lived harmoniously side by side.

  Rhuna stood to watch a while longer as the thin line across the horizon quickly expanded, allowing the sun’s rays to reach ever farther across the snow-topped peaks, chasing away the oppressive cold darkness of night. She looked down to see fresh pale light splash across the deep valley below, and soon the majestic landscape had completely unfolded in front of her.

  Sated from the beauty she beheld, Rhuna finally stepped back from the window and breathed in deeply to prepare her mind for the challenging tasks ahead. Each day of their snowbound sojourn in the Land at the Top of the World brought new and startling revelations about the Black City in the faraway wilderness. Her eyes scanned the distant horizon as she imagined traversing the unknown landscape beyond the rugged mountain peaks within her view. Sighing with resignation, she turned away from the window and took her cup of steaming hot tea, letting the heat warm her fingers before she sipped the stimulating brew.

  “Bah!” Goram grimaced as he drank his tea. “Trapped in this frozen vault, forced to drink tea with rancid butter! How do these people bear it?”

  Rhuna ignored Goram’s familiar complaints and smiled at her daughter instead.

  “The view is always so breathtaking here. I never tire of it,” sighed Lozira as she looked through the window at the magnificent scenery. Rhuna turned back briefly to see icy peaks glitter like precious gemstones in the growing sunlight.

  “The sight of you leaves me far more breathless, My Precious,” Goram said, putting his arm around Lozira and pulling her close to his side.

  Rhuna looked at her first daughter with love and pride, agreeing with Goram that Lozira had never looked more beautiful than today. She recalled a time at the beginning of their confinement in the mountainside dwellings when she held deep concern for her daughter’s wellbeing.

  “How I yearn for the day we are free to leave this place,” Goram groaned with frustration. “Each day the Dark One’s power grows and the Black City flourishes while we rot in this foul place!”

  “We’re not rotting!” Rhuna protested. “We’ve made good use of our confinement by improving our understanding of the Dark One’s work, as well as improving our own skills and powers.” She looked at her daughter and thought of the remarkable improvement in her emotional wellbeing, despite their challenging situation in a harsh environment.

  “The Masters of Ancient Wisdom have taught me a great deal,” Lozira said, as if knowing Rhuna’s thoughts. “Their wisdom has helped me heal emotional wounds and gain control of myself – and of my life,” she stated with calm confidence. Rhuna glowed with pride and admiration at her daughter’s great accomplishment.

  “And we have both learned the art of writing and reading,” Lozira added, smiling brightly at Rhuna.

  “Yes, the League of Record-Keeping Masters has taught us well,” Rhuna agreed. “And they have taught us various forms of meditation and Inside Focussing to empower our mental skills so that we are stronger and more knowledgeable than ever before.”

  “That is so,” Goram agreed with a quick nod. “Yet we cannot improve ourselves any further in this place. It is time to see the Black City with our very own eyes!”

  Rhuna shuddered at the thought of visiting the sinister Black City which defied all logic, and threatened to turn the known world upside-down.

  “Duga said that the snow has already begun to melt on the lower mountains, and that we could leave here as soon as in ten days,” Lozira said. Rhuna looked across the common room and saw the friendly local man named Duga tending to the needs of a group of elderly people huddled around one of the cook
ing stoves. Then Rhuna saw her mother seated in another part of the room fussing over the long and unwieldy hair of an elderly woman, and the sight made her smile.

  “Let us assemble after the morning meal to make departure plans!” Goram suggested with enthusiasm. Rhuna felt fear of the unknown and eager anticipation of change war inside her. She turned around looking for the rest of her family and friends who began emerging from the dark sleeping areas within the mountain. The sight of Aradin entering the common rooms with their young daughter comforted her.

  “Rhuna!” Shandi called as she left Aradin’s side and ran towards Rhuna.

  “She is growing up so fast!” Lozira remarked as Rhuna kneeled to embrace her child and kiss her rosy cheek.

  “We can leave the abode of the Masters in three days!” Shandi announced with confidence.

  “Really? So soon?” Aradin asked as he approached them. Rhuna leaned towards him as he smiled and then kissed her cheek.

  “Duga said in ten days, at least,” Lozira remarked. “The outside door is still unmovable due to snow and ice.”

  “We can leave in three days,” Shandi repeated.

  “She has knowledge of the future,” Goram stated. “Three days it is then – splendid!” Goram rubbed his hands together in delight as he looked at everyone with bright, shiny eyes. Rhuna glanced at her first daughter and noticed that Lozira’s expression was tinged with sadness.

  “Ah, here come the others!” Goram announced, striding briskly towards the gathering. Rhuna remained standing near Lozira until Aradin and Shandi had followed Goram to greet the others.

  “Do you still want to return to our house in Cha’al?” Rhuna asked her daughter.

  “Oh no,” Lozira replied adamantly. “Goram would be terribly bored there,” she said with a quick laugh. “He needs new and interesting challenges.”

  Rhuna agreed with her daughter, and then recalled the time just before the first snowfall. “Before the snow trapped us here, you wanted to go home to Cha’al and have a baby.”

  Lozira’s face flushed deeply as she looked down at the floor for a long moment. “That is in the past,” she said in a hushed tone.

  “You haven’t told Goram what you really want?” Rhuna asked in a similar hushed tone as she moved closer to Lozira.

  “Oh no!” Lozira shook her head vehemently as she continued to avoid looking at Rhuna.

  “But it’s important to tell him how…”

  “It is not important any longer,” Lozira interrupted, and then quickly turned to follow Goram. Rhuna watched her daughter walk away, and then finally joined her family and friends. She entered the adjoining room, aware of the comfortable familiarity of the common area filled with cooking odours and the sounds of people gathering in groups and families to share a meal.

  Rhuna walked across the bare wooden floor between tables and people seated on padding or cushions as they ate their morning meal of boiled grains and preserved vegetables. The daily routine of food preparation had become monotonous, and she secretly longed for a greater variety of different foods which she knew was not possible until the snow and ice had thawed. Despite the grueling monotony, she returned the friendly smiles of the local residents who ate the bland food with relish as she walked past. Although she had never learned to speak their language in order to communicate with them, Rhuna felt a strong bond with them simply due to sharing the close confines of the mountain-dwelling community during the harsh cold season.

  “Kiana found some preserved fruit in one of the storage areas and put it into our potage,” Lozira said as Rhuna took her place next to Aradin and Shandi. Rhuna looked across the table at her mother who nodded proudly at her initiative to make the morning meals more palatable.

  “Potage?” Aradin repeated with a snicker. “Will it taste better if you give it a more distinguished name?” Goram grunted his agreement as Kiana scowled at them.

  Rhuna smiled at the affable exchange as she glanced at the faces around the table, feeling deep affection for each person. She realized that the forced co-habitation in cramped quarters had strengthened family bonds and deepened friendships. Her parents appeared to be much more comfortable with each other, Mohandu and Yarqi were like brother and sister to everyone, and Shandi’s favourite playmate, Panapu, had become dear to everyone.

  “Shandi foresees that we can leave in three days already,” Aradin announced as he finished his last mouthful of gruel.

  “Then we must make preparations to depart,” Mohandu said, his head bobbing eagerly.

  “There is much to discuss first,” Damell said gravely as he sipped his bitter hot tea. Rhuna looked at her father and thought his hair had turned a lighter shade of grey lately. “We have made no solid plans, and we lack vital information concerning the Dark Master’s reign in the Black City,” Damell said with a frown.

  “We should discuss these matters right now,” Goram stated firmly, and then pushed his half-empty bowl away. “How I yearn for tasty food and a warmer climate!” he groaned as he looked out of the window.

  Rhuna turned to look at the pale sky through the thick glass, and felt a sudden urge to escape the icy bonds in the abode of the Masters of Ancient Wisdom. She looked at her father as he cleared his throat and prepared to address everyone as the most senior member of the group.

  “Shall we commence with a summary of what we know and have learned thus far,” Damell suggested, glancing briefly at everyone seated around the table. Rhuna and several others nodded in response. “The Dark Master manipulated a time loop…” he began.

  “A well-known phenomenon in the land of Varappa, particularly in the vicinity of Judharo where it was common to experience a repetition of events,” Goram continued. Rhuna recalled the disorienting experience of reliving events when they visited the city of Judharo, and how the city’s residents had become accustomed to this extraordinary phenomenon.

  “Some people discovered various ways of manipulating these time loops using crystals, and the Dark Master developed this knowledge further by building a portal entirely from crystal,” Rhuna continued. “The portal enhanced the controlling power over the time loops to such an extent that he could literally step through into the distant past.”

  “Where he established a settlement in the vast sandy wilderness far beyond our horizons,” Aradin quickly added. “That place is known as the Black City, and it appeared instantly out of the wilderness, yet people speak of it as if it had always been there.”

  “Like those camel drivers we met, who claimed they had been travelling their route between the Black City and other lands for many solar cycles, yet the villagers had never seen them before, nor had they ever heard of the Black City,” Rhuna said, recalling the puzzling events.

  “A city appears instantly in our present time because the Dark One stepped into the past – how bizarre!” Mohandu shook his head vigorously as if trying to clear his mind of cobwebs that dulled his thinking process.

  “Perhaps a simple illustration shall serve to clarify,” Damell suggested as he reached for one of the large food bowls on the table, removed some scraps of food and poured some water into it. He waited for the surface to become smooth, and then took a crumb from the food scraps, tossing it into the middle of the bowl.

  “Observe the ripples in the water expanding outward from the center,” Damell said. Mohandu leaned over to look at the movement on the water’s surface.

  “Imagine the food scrap in the center is the Dark Master who has stepped into the past, arriving in a place in the wilderness,” Damell continued. Mohandu nodded slowly. “Now imagine that these many rings emanating from the center are the eight hundred solar cycles since his arrival in that past time period.”

  Rhuna leaned over to see the ripples in the bowl.

  “The past,” Damell said, pointing to the food scrap in the middle, “…and the present time,” he continued, moving his finger to the outer edge of the bowl.

  “What we see in our present time is the result of what t
he Dark One did eight hundred solar cycles in the past,” Mohandu concluded with a sharp nod of comprehension. “And the city seemed to appear in an instant in the middle of the wilderness because it did not exist until the Dark One stepped back in time!” Mohandu grinned triumphantly at his sudden grasp of this conundrum.

  “Whatever he did when he first arrived there has had all these generations to grow,” Aradin said with a deepening frown as he pondered his own words.

  “And that is why the city continues to change in our present time,” Yarqi said, her piercing black eyes staring at the bowl Damell had used as an illustration. “Whatever the Dark Master does in the past appears in our present time.”

  Shandi stopped playing with her eating utensil and looked up at the adults around her. “He is from our time,” she stated, and then quickly returned to her game with a spoon.

  Rhuna looked at Aradin and then at her father. “We should remember her words,” Rhuna said softly. “Even when it makes no sense to us at first, her words always prove to be important to our understanding.”

  Everyone looked at Shandi in silence for a long moment, watching the innocent child trace an imaginary pattern on the table with her spoon.

  “Yes…” Damell said slowly. “The Dark One is from our time, yet he has entered a different time period in the past, and this is the reason his actions change the course of events that were recorded in oral and written histories.”

  Rhuna recalled the first time she and the Record-Keeping League of Masters had seen such an historic text change before their very eyes. The sheer terror she experienced at witnessing such an unnatural phenomenon resurfaced, and she quickly pushed the memory aside.

  “We have learned from the changed records in the Depository of Archival Texts that the lives of various people have been drastically changed,” Aradin said solemnly. “Perhaps lives even extinguished when a new course of events crashed through time…”