It had been decades since the loss of the Sword of Trueterra, lost to the flood when King Solay restored the pent-up waters through his heroic actions.
But now, King Solay sought the return of the sword so that the succession of kings could take place. From time out of mind, the new kings succeeded the old by cutting off their heads with this legendary sword. Without the sword, without the old king’s sacrifice being ceremoniously achieved, believers felt unknown consequences would certainly befall the kingdom.
Not all the cats believed. The controversy divided the kingdom. Solay’s own two sons disagreed with each other. Into this maelstrom, Callie, granddaughter of King’s Solay’s closest advisor, drawn in despite her not taking sides, found herself on a mission to reclaim the relic with two other young companions, a mystic and the king’s own son.
They traveled south of Trueterra, beyond World’s End, through the swamp called the Miseries, into a land unknown to them for all but a sketchy map.
Are the souls of these young cats equal to the task?
It had been decades since the loss of the Sword of Trueterra, lost to the flood when King Solay restored the pent-up waters through his heroic actions.
But now, King Solay sought the return of the sword so that the succession of kings could take place. From time out of mind, the new kings succeeded the old by cutting off their heads with this legendary sword. Without the sword, without the old king’s sacrifice being ceremoniously achieved, believers felt unknown consequences would certainly befall the kingdom.
Not all the cats believed. The controversy divided the kingdom. Solay’s own two sons disagreed with each other. Into this maelstrom, Callie, granddaughter of King’s Solay’s closest advisor, drawn in despite her not taking sides, found herself on a mission to reclaim the relic with two other young companions, a mystic and the king’s own son.
They traveled south of Trueterra, beyond World’s End, through the swamp called the Miseries, into a land unknown to them for all but a sketchy map.
Are the souls of these young cats equal to the task?
Callie tightened her grip on the long wooden stave, as she drove it hard against her sparring partner’s, knocking the stave from his paws. It clattered to the floor, echoing through the practice room.
“You let her in too close,” shouted Lord Graysley, standing near the stave rack, pointing a stern claw at Callie’s opponent. “Again, same pattern.”
The sparring partner, whom his fellow kittens called Tattletail, picked up his weapon. Disgust swept across his face.
Callie thrilled at getting the better of him. Here was retribution for his taunting her for being too short and “pretending” to be a soldier.
Callie struck first, lower this time. He deflected, but her stave touched both his ears before he could regain balance.
“You’re thinking,” Graysley addressed Tattletail. “Stop thinking! React! React! Again, same pattern.”
As she trounced Tattletail for a third time, Cordin, the King’s youngest son, entered the practice room, his chain mail shirt giving off a gentle “ching” as he walked.
Callie’s eyes narrowed. What does he want?
Tattletail’s stave knocked her upside the head.
“Unfair!” Callie called, taking an attack stance, facing Tattletail and his wicked grin.
“True and too late,” said Graysley. “In battle, you would be dead. Never let your guard down.”
He turned to Cordin. They greeted each other, touching their paws to their foreheads.
“My father wishes your presence this evening for a council. Also, please accept our condolences for the death in your family.”
Graysley nodded. The two saluted each other again, and Cordin left as abruptly as he’d come.
Graysley turned to his trainees. “That will be all for this morning; return your staves to the rack.”
As Tattletail did so, Callie gave him a quick whack on the butt with her stave before placing it back in its assigned space.
“Grandfather,” frowned Callie, turning to Lord Graysley, “that’s about the Key, isn’t it?” Rumors floated around the castle—more than rumors—there were accusations and threats.
He stood, his back against the stone wall beyond the rack of staves and did not speak until Tattletail left the practice room.
“He didn’t say that.”
She loosened the stays on her leather jerkin. “Tell me the story of the Key again.”
“Oh—not now. We need to get ready for the funeral.”
“You’re wiggling out of telling,” Callie pouted.
“Your grandmother can tell that story better than I.”
“Wiggle, wiggle.” Callie prodded. But he gazed, unfocused, before he spoke again.
“I had a dream last night of a placid river entering into rapids. I suspect Solay has had similar dreams and feels compelled to act. Of course the council will be about the Key.”
#
Graysley and Callie ambled through the arched castle gateway, over the heavy wooden drawbridge, and down the winding path toward the town of Ailuros, a walled fortress itself, at the foot of the hill.
“Will Grandmother be the next storyteller?”
Graysley’s brow whiskers lowered. “Felina hasn’t spoken to me about it.”
Callie, in that moment, regretted asking the question. Graysley and Felina had spoken little to each other since the question of the Key, the Sword of Succession, arose.
They walked under the stone arch of the town gate. The plaza inside the gate gave way to houses crowding the streets. A goat’s bleating echoed down an alleyway where an old tabby milked her. The odor of fish drifted from many windows. Meowing kittens darted past them in a game of chase, racing toward the commons that lay in the center of town. The commons, an open, grassy sward, had but one structure in its center: First House.
After her parents died during a plague, Callie and her litter mates came to live at First House. Though of simple construction, it had the capacity to hold quite a crowd. There the community gathered to listen to Dame Calico, after whom Callie was named, and told the stories on which she grew up.
Grandfather Graysley was Dame Calico’s great-nephew. Callie pondered how many greats that made between herself and Dame Calico.
Today, before the sun set, the community would lay Dame Calico to rest and gather once more at First House for the funeral feast.
#
Callie tried to listen to the funeral-feast orator standing by the hearth—a granduncle or a great-granduncle, she couldn’t recall.
He cleared his throat. “Dame Calico, our healer and storyteller for as long as any cat in Ailuros can remember, was the last one alive to have known all the heroes of the Black Squirrel War, outliving even BraceLion, the youngest of those heroes. Her passing marks the end of an age.”
Callie lost interest in the speech. Her eyes followed her grandmother, Felina, who moved through the room attending to the guests.
As the granduncle rambled on, the town cats and soldiers ate at the low tables; on soft, pillow-like curl-ups; or sat on their haunches along the walls. The smell of baked fish set out on the trenchers and the scent of drying herbs hung from ceiling rafters filled the air. The light of late afternoon filtered through the windows.
Callie’s attention wandered to Dame Calico’s curl-up, Which sat at the foot of the orator, empty except for a wreath of flowers Felina had placed there. From that curl-up, on many a night for those gathered, Dame Calico told her stories about Aquair—the first king, the kings that followed, the battles fought, the loves lost, and the heroes who stood firm.
After the granduncle's droning speech ended, which elicited nods and words of agreement, conversations rose to fill the cat’s ears as they filled their mouths.
“There can’t be a new king without the Key,” one cat argued a little too loudly. “Might the drought not return if the king is not sacrificed? It is cruel, true, but might the Aquair dry up again? The crops fail?”
“That is stale history,” said a younger cat, “A myth, really.”
“Oh no,” said the other, “I am old enough to remember the drought. It was real enough; all brought on by King Katmose VIII when he failed to abide by the proper order of succession when his time came.”
“More myth,” said the younger.
The elder cat bristled, “You’ve not shed enough fur to know your tail from your . . .”
“Gentlecats, please,” spoke Graysley from across the room. “This is not the time or place for such talk.”
The elder cat put up a paw and bowed his head in consent. The younger shifted uncomfortably in his curl-up and said no more.
“What has King Solay said of Dame Calico’s passing?” another cat asked one of the castle soldiers.
“He stands for hours on the north wall, staring across the countryside, watching the river. He did that when each of his two queens passed, which speaks more than words of his affection for Dame Calico.”
Callie’s attention drifted again, recalling a conversation, one she overheard in this very room not more than a year ago.
“My kitten,” said the Dame to Callie’s grandmother. “Stories are meant to make the young ones laugh, let the old ones remember, but mostly to nudge them into thinking, without them knowing the story has done so. If a story can find a listener ‘before thought,’ then it can deliver a message. That message, though, belongs to the listener, not to you.”
Felina asked, “Then how can I be sure they get the message they need to hear?”
Dame Calico put her thin paw to her jowl, then gestured with claws outstretched to the main room of First House. “This is a sacred space. Trust it. And trust yourself. These walls have heard many stories before mine. Tell the first story that jumps to mind no matter how unsuitable it may seem. As the story unfolds it will become clear why you tell it. There is art in this, therefore an uncertain thing. Trust in the story.”
Callie noticed some of the cats gathering dishes. Others sat and talked of last year’s hunt. No one left. Callie sensed that an unspoken wish for something more to commemorate the occasion kept them.
Felina took off her apron and walked to Dame Calico’s curl-up. She picked up the wreath made of the Dame’s favorite flowers, caressed it with her paw, then cast it into the fire of the hearth. All the cats in the room stopped what they were doing, knowing what this meant. It burned for a minute as the assembled mourners watched. Then Felina settled down into Dame Calico’s curl-up and began a story.
“Laszor, the poet, understood the language of birds. Some said that the birds were the source of his poetry. He talked to the falcon Cirrus, who built his lofty nest in the Aeries to the north . . .”
As Felina told her story, every ear pitched forward. No sound intruded into the room save her voice. It filled the space of the greatroom, carrying the listeners off, weaving them into the fabric of the tale. When she finished, an audible sigh of contentment filled the air. They knew the tradition would continue.
Some guests lingered as other guests departed. Callie carried a stack of dishes to the kitchen, then slipped out after Tattletail, who headed for the road back to his home in the castle barracks. She all but collared him.
“Listen, I know—everyone knows—Cordin’s views, but what goes on between King Solay and Prince Martel?”
“They’re at odds,” he said casually.
“I know that! What does Martel plan to do when—you know . . .”
“He wouldn’t touch the Key—if we had it. He has said as much. But then, we don’t have it do we?”
“They’re going to search for the Key,” Callie declared.
“Are they?”
“I’m sure of it.”
“Your grandfather would know.” His eyes narrowed.
“I probably shouldn’t have told you that.” Callie folded her arms.
“Still, if they find it, Martel won’t use that sword to do—you know what.”
Callie’s whiskers twitched. “Can King Solay force Martel to use the sword on him?”
“I don’t see how. I haven’t seen King Solay and Martel together, much less speaking to each other. I’ll freely tell you, I think we had better get the sword or something awful will happen. Whose side are you on?”
“I’m not choosing.”
“How can you not?”
“I’d be choosing between my grandparents.”
“Well, yes, still, you have to choose,” insisted Tattletail.
If her stave were in her hand, she’d have walloped him upside his head for speaking the truth.
#
After all the funeral guests left, Callie put her leather jerkin back on and waited for Graysley to tell Felina of the summons.
Graysley paced the floor while he spoke. Felina’s ears flattened, and her round eyes flared. “You will do what you must,” she said. “But if you leave me and the grandkittens to go off questing, you leave me with my anger. I make no promise of what you will find upon your return.”
Graysley’s fur bristled at the sharpness in her voice. He grabbed his sword, belting it about his waist as he strode to the door, drawing it hard behind him. Callie opened and slipped through the same door before Felina could utter a word in protest.
Callie caught up with him in mid-growl. “Go back,” he demanded.
“You’re going to council,” she stated flatly.
“Of course.”
“Then you need a sword-bearer. Decorum demands it.”
Graysley closed his eyes, but a grin creased his lips. “I should know better than to deny you. You will wheedle your way in. Good then, you are my sword-bearer.”
Night fell as they made their way to the castle.
“You were with King Solay when he lost the sword—the Key.” Callie knew this from Dame Calico’s stories.
“‘Lost’ or ‘taken’? I wonder which. Our mystic, Bianca, failed to untangle the mystery.” Then he spoke no more.
When Graysley and Callie entered the council chamber, they walked through a broad, empty space between rows of pillars supporting a lofty ceiling. High along both sides were windows that during the day let light streak in as the sun moved from east to west, falling upon the opposite wall, illuminating the tapestries that hung there. But now the chamber lay in secretive darkness, lit only by a few candles set on a heavy wooden table placed at the far end of the hall, dwarfed by the sheer size of the room.
King Solay sat at the head of the table with Cordin beside him. Along either side of the table were a few of the town Elders and young Melane, the court mystic since Bianca’s passing. Melane appeared as secretive as the room itself, the hood of his mantle hiding his face.
Graysley unbelted his sword, handing it to Callie, who retreated to the far wall to stand beside Prince Cordin’s sword-bearer, as Graysley sat down in a curl-up.
“All are present,” Cordin informed his father. Obvious, in his absence, was the king’s heir, Prince Martel.
“Gentlecats and dames.” Solay looked to the Elders. “I have called you here for your advice. You know already our intent?”
“We do,” the oldest of them rose and addressed Solay. “After much consideration, may we suggest a small party of travelers and a ploy? We envision a party of three: Cordin, a companion, and a servant, actually one of the he-kittens-in-training acting as a servant. The ploy is that the companion would appear as the head of the party on a harmless quest, while Cordin poses as a mere bodyguard to the companion, to draw attention away from himself.”
Solay stirred. “You would send a youth into danger?”
“A youth would ensure the harmless appearance of these travelers.”
Solay stared at the scepter he held in his paw. “I find wisdom in these words, but the plan leaves only three sets of eyes to search for the sword.”
“How many eyes are needed?” replied the eldest. “An infinite number may not suffice.”
“We will not find the sword,” spoke Melane with a glint in his eye, slipping back the cowl of his mantle. “We must be led to it. Therefore, I concur with our Elders. The smaller the party—the less notice it attracts—the better.”
Solay’s claws clicked on his scepter. “What do you mean we will be led to the sword instead of finding it? Led by whom?”
“By the Three Immortals. Bianca spoke of them and of the sword. She believed the Key, when lost to the river Aquair, returned to the sea, to the shores from which its ore came. She said the lore speaks of the Three Immortals and a place called the Revered City. It is they who can tell us how to retrieve the sword.”
Melane leaned forward to emphasize his next point.
“Why Bianca pointed me toward this knowledge I did not comprehend until I heard that this journey would be taken. I now understand she meant for me to help find the sword. May I suggest myself to accompany Cordin?”
“Where is the Revered City?” asked Solay.
Melane put his paw on a scroll that lay in front of him, unrolled it, and moved it toward King Solay.
“I’ve not seen this map before.” The hall kept silent while Solay studied it until he spoke again. “The cats abandoned the Revered City after the Gray Squirrel War and the immigration north. I see it is far to the south, beyond the desert land.” Solay gave his son Cordin a worried glance.
Melane continued his point.
“Our ploy can be to have myself, a mystic, on a pilgrimage to visit this place. It is near the truth, and truth is easier to sustain than a lie.”
Solay’s claws clicked again on his scepter. “I know of the Three Immortals as a legend. You feel they exist?”
“I do not doubt that. Whether we can find them in the Revered City, whether they will speak to us, is another matter.”
“Well,” said Cordin glibly, “as impossible tasks go, that doesn’t sound too bad.”
Solay shot him a father’s withering look.
“My Lord,” Graysley spoke. “I suggest myself as the third of the company, instead of a he-kitten-in-training. There will be much danger in this journey and need of another skilled sword.”
Callie knew her grandfather’s demeanor and that what Graysley said pained him. She also knew his devotion to duty and understood he could not back away.
To her surprise, Solay said, “No, can I risk my son and my closest advisor, instructor to my warriors, all on one mission? I wish to go myself, but this cannot be. You have accompanied me on my adventures before,” Solay said with gentleness. “Now you must stay behind with me.”
Graysley conceded with a nod. The tension in Callie’s muscles relaxed. Her grandfather had done his duty; no fault of cowardice could fall upon him.
“That Melane should go with Cordin was one of the possibilities we had in mind,” said the eldest. “If our Lord agrees, then we need only decide on a ‘servant.’”
“I do agree.” Solay tapped his claw again on his scepter. “My heart trembles at the recklessness of what we attempt. We send three of our own blindly into an unknown land. But the order of succession must be preserved. The Key must be used upon me.”
The Elders glanced at one another uncomfortably until Solay spoke again.
“Have you thought of somecat to fill this last role?”
“Yes,” spoke the eldest, “in that it should be a lottery. Let fate have its paw in our plans.”
“Fate drives us all,” said Solay. He rolled the scepter in his paws. “Let us adjourn to the practice room. Cordin will be blindfolded and then choose a stave from the rack. The he-kitten who owns the stave is the third member of the party.”
They soon stood in the middle of the wide, empty space of the practice room lit by the candles they brought, facing the rack of staves against the far wall. After an Elder put a blindfold over his eyes, Cordin walked briskly toward the rack, knowing exactly how many paces he must be from the wall, having covered that space so many times during his youthful training. He stopped, walked along the wall, his paw hovering in front of the staves. On impulse, he plucked one from the rack, removed the blindfold, and walked over to Graysley to identify the stave.
Callie already knew.
“Felina will never forgive me,” Graysley murmured.
After A Vacant Throne : Dreams of the sleeping cat, this is the second book in the Trueterra series. Although reading the first book would significantly enhance your understanding of the present characters and the history that connects them to their ancestors, you can also enjoy this book as a standalone. Kiernan has a way with words that leaves readers enraptured. As soon as you start reading the book, it sweeps you off your feet and transports you to the realm of Trueterra, as if you're travelling with the three cats yourself.
What is particularly interesting to note is how storytelling plays an important role in the saga, which could in fact encourage young readers to slowly learn to find value in stories themselves. This could allow children to genuinely appreciate literature and perhaps take an interest in reading too. By recreating a world of cats and squirrels while putting emphasis on the little cats as the main characters, the author moulds the story in such a way that it predominantly addresses a younger generation. To this point, maybe having a few adorable illustrations could make it slightly more appealing.
However, from the inclusion of a detailed map at the beginning of the book to coming up with meaningful riddles and poems, establishing the essence of friendship, the need for proper communication, the possibility of reaching an understanding despite difference in opinions, and by portraying characters that stood up for their principles while still relying on one another, the author has demonstrated exceptional sincerity in writing this story for his impressionable audience. It is indeed heartening to see such dedication as children's books often get side-lined or written with a mentality that fails to identify its real importance. Throughout this book, the language remains simple and easy to grasp, yet with a certain lexical flair that would help enrich the existing vocabulary of children.
Although it would have been really inspiring to see Callie actively contributing in the mission other than being relegated to a secondary position of cooking and cleaning up after Cordin and Melane, or serving as a training companion for the young prince, and despite gaining clairvoyance not having enough agency to do much with her newly acquired power; it was still nice to see her bonding with Fallflower and speaking up for not being informed about Kail's intention to marry her prior to her adoption ceremony. All in all, this is a delightful read for all ages!