Re-write: Quest for Lost Heroes by David Gemmell  

Chareos rode along the hillside, observing his once short lived home of Dreanan, but that was a life time ago. Chareos was sent from his home at Dros Delnoch when he was only eight. He stilled remembering leaving as if it were yesterday, the screams of people as the Nadir entered the city; killing everyone in their path. Chereos and his mother were sent with a small squadron of guard to the Dreanan capital, as he left he waved goodbye to his father, the Earl of Dros Delnoch who would not leave the fortress that was entrusted to his family, Chareos knew that would be the last time that he would see his father. Dros Delnoch fell a few days later.

Chareos didn’t spend long in the capital before the Nadir reached it. He and his mother fled again, to where Chareos didn’t know nor would he ever as they were attacked on their journey by a Nadir scouting party. Chareos lost his mother during the attack. The few guards that survived took him in a new direction. By the time Chareos was ten he had found a new home in Gothir.

As Chareos turned back towards the city he noticed a cloud of smoke rising from a near by village. He made a quick detour and rode toward the village; about a five minute hard ride away. As he rode he came up to a group of soldier, he recognised the captain; Logar.

‘Logar, I believe the nearby village is under attack!’ Logar moved right up to Chareos’ horse, which instinctually backed off away from the approaching man.

‘Mind your own business’ Logar ordered. Confused; Chareos continued.

‘The village needs your help, they wont be able to defend themselves’ Chareos argued. Logar just ignored the remark, turning away and leading his horse back on route. ‘Damn you’ Chareos swore at the man as he rode off to aid the villge.

Chareos drew his sabre as he made his way towards the nearest Nadir. The Nadir turned, noticing the sound of hooves approaching. As the Nadir readied to strike Chareos dismounted his horse easily, he was not afraid of man to man combat being strong in the art from years of training. Chareos let the Nadir raider take a few blows before he eyed an opening in the Nadir’s defences. The next time the Nadir made a swing from the right Chareos thrust his sword into the Nadirs belly. The Nadir soldier fell and although Chareos knew he would survive the wound, he was out of the battle so he moved on to the next Nadir raider. The battle didn’t last long before the raiders got what they wanted; people to enslave.

Chareos looked around the attacked village seeing what demage was done until a young man walked up to Chareos ‘What are you waiting for? Go after them! They took 11 of our women’ the man cried out to Chareos.

‘I can’t…’

‘You can... you have a horse! Ride after them!’ Chareos decided to take a different approach.

‘Yes I could ride after them,’ he admitted. ‘But they but they would greatly outnumber me. I would surely be killed.’

‘What? Will no one help us? You won’t. The Earl didn’t...’ the villager bellowed.

‘Well I am one man and the Earl mustn’t have been able to muster his men in time,’ Chareos did not mention the Earl’s troops on the other side of the forest so to protect the Earl’s rreputation. As for Logar, Chareos would report him to the Earl for not doing his duty as a soldier to protect the weak and innocent.

‘He did! We warned him of the attack three days ago. He’s done nothing to protect us!’

‘You knew about the attack three days ago?’ asked Chareos.

‘Yes, and we warned the Earl as soon as we found out’ Chareos was taken aback by the statement. The Earl wouldn’t have left his people to be attacked like this, without the protection of trained and armed soldiers.

‘How did you know of the attack?’ he demanded.

‘We have a seer in town…..’

 ‘I have to go’ Chareos said as he moved away from the young villager towards his horse.  

As Chareos moved away from the villager the villager asked ‘Are you going to save those that were taken?’

‘No’ replied Chareos as he mounted his horse.

As Chareos rode pass the villager, the villager shouted out ‘COWARD’. Chareos didn’t have time to turn back and deal with the insult, he had more inportant things to do.

Chareos rode towards the city. He had to speak to the Earl immediately about the situation.

Logar had sold out the Earl’s people probably for a fist full of gold. Chareos had known the Earl for many years, they met upon the Earl seeking Chareos’ expertise with the sword. Chareos and the Earl became quite close friends during the training, the Earl even invited Chareos to sit on his council, aiding the Earl in his decisions about the state.

Charoes continued to serve the Earl for years, they fended off Nadir raids together. Chareos knew Logar wouldn’t get away with this betrayal. Or would he? Logar is the Earl’s champion and  captain of the guards, if he didn’t want to go down he could put up a bit of a fight; which the Earl wouldn’t want to be in public; nor would Chareos for Logar was a cruel man who fought without honour, kicking his opponent when they were down, showing off his skill with the blade and toying with his opponent when most of them were untrained citizens on trial (by combat). No, Logar would not go down easily and he would take out as many citizens as he could.

Chareos made his way to the keep where he knew the Earl would be as it was late afternoon and the Earl held public judgement. Chareos made his way around the back of the keep to allow him to approach the Earl easier than moving through the large crowd that had gathered to the Earl to settle differences.

Chareos waited for the Earl to pass judgement on a noble man and farmer. The farmer claimed that the noble asked to buy a cow of his for a feast the noble men had. The noble man promised to pay a quarter up front and the rest upon receiving the cow from the butcher however the noble man only payed for half the cow and refused to pay for the rest. The Earl sided in favor of the farmer saying that the price was fair and the noble should pay, he also fined the noble man for his cruelty and trying to rob a poor farmer.

Once the Earl made the decision; Chareos moved beside him. ‘My Lord, I have a matter of great urgency to dicuss with you’ he whispered.

‘It can wait,’ the Earl dismissed Chareos, who just moved back behind the Earl to wait until he was ready to listen.

Chareos waited for near an hour for the Earl to finish passing judgement when the young man from the village came storming in the keep ‘MY LORD’ he was calling, guards went to stop him. He managed to get passed them and ran up to the Earl; ‘My lord, our village was attacked!’ the guards managed to restrain him now.

‘Let him go’ the Earl said.

‘I am Kiall, my Lord. I’m from a village about an hours ride north of here. Our village was attacked! Several of our men were killed and 11 women were taken. You didn’t protect us, when we needed your help!’

the Earl stood up ‘I’m sorry for your village’s loss but there is nothing I can do about it now.’

‘There is, you can send soldiers to retrieve our women who were taken.’

‘I cant by now they would be in Nadir lands...’

‘YOU CAN STILL GO AFTER THEM’ Kiall roared.

‘No, I cant. If my men are caught in Nadir land then we risk war with the Nadir. A war we have no hope of winning. Would you have me risk hundreds of lives to save 11 women?’

‘Well you could have protected them in the first place. What are we paying you taxes for if you don’t protect us?’

‘I had no way of knowing your village was going to be attacked...’

‘No way? You had no way of knowing? I came here three days ago warning you of the ATTACK!’

‘And you had no proof.’

‘Our village seer saw the attack.’

‘Seers get things wrong’ the Earl said, as he did Chareos saw the Earl’s seer shake his head. ‘I could not risk removing soldiers from the city, for we could have been attacked as well’ the Earl contined.

‘Damn you!’ Kiall swore at the Earl ‘Damn you, you bloody coward!’

‘Arrest him’ the Earl cried. The guards ran to grab Kiall who put up a fight. Once the guards restrained Kiall the Earl said ‘Take him to the square and have him whipped!’

‘Yes sir’ replied one of the guards before he and the others forced Kiall out of the keep.

‘That is enough for the day’ the Earl said furious, he hated being questioned like that by someone of a lower station, even more so in public.

After the Earl dismissed his council and the keep was clearing Chareos walked to the Earl’s Seer. ‘May I talk to you?’ he asked. The seer nodded briefly. ‘Did you see the attack on the village?’

‘I did. The Earl knew about it as well and he knew the Nadir raiders would attack the city, he’s making up excuses.’

‘To protect Logar?’

‘No himself.’

‘What did he do?’

‘The Earl sent troops with his most beloved champion to watch the raid and to collect payment.’

‘What? Do you mean that the Earl sold these people to the Nadir?’

‘Yes, I do.’

Chareos pushed open the doors to the Earl’s chamber, where he found the Earl and Logar talking. ‘My lord I must talk you to!’ Chareos roared.

‘Not now’ replied the Earl.

‘Yes NOW!’ Chareos roared louder.

‘Do you want me to take care of him, my lord?’ asked Logar as he drew his sabre.

Before the Earl could answer Chareos spoke ‘Is it true you sold your own people to the Nadir?’

‘It is, Master Chareos’ was all the Earl replied with.

Logar moved towards Chareos who readyed himself for an attack.

‘Stop’ ordered the Earl ‘Logar leave us!’ Logar obeyed the Earl and left the room, once he was gone Chareos relaxed himself from the thought of an attack. ‘What is it that you want Chareos?’

‘I want to know why you betrayed your people for these barbarians?’

‘Why it was for gold.’

‘I helped you, trained your men! And this is how you repay me by aiding the Nadir! Letting them slaughter your people! The people you swore to protect!’

‘I had no other choice… I was given the choice between letting them ride in and take slaves as they want or risk full scale war with the Nadir. Gothir is small and weak, look at your people, look at the Dreanai, back fifty; seventy years ago they were considered the greatest race in the world. Now look at them; the ones that died in the fight with the Nadir were the lucky ones. The ones that didn’t or were too cowardly to fight are now slaves; cleaning up the shit of them Nadir bastards! DREANAN IS DEAD. So don’t call me a coward, I sacrafice a hundred to save thousands, would you have me go to war against the Nadir? Gothir would lose, we don’t stand a hope against these barbarians.’   

There was a long pause between the two men until Chareos responded with ‘You are a coward. Dreanan may be dead but at least we had the courage to stand and fight to save our people from the terror and horror that Nadir bring with them. Gothir deserves a better Earl than you.’

The Earl didn’t take the insult well, responding with ‘get out of my sight worthless maggot. In fact get out of Gothir, if I ever see you again I will have you hung!’

‘So be it’ Chareos left the Earl without bowing, heading to the grand doors to the keep. Chareos couldn’t work for the Earl training his soldiers now that he knew the Earl was selling his own people to the Nadir but he could not help but feel the Earl may have been right. But is it better to sacrifice a hundred doomed to be slaves, raped and beaten than to allow that fate on the whole population of Gothir? But still it is the Earl’s job to protect and watch over his  people.

Once Chareos left the keep he made his way to the city square where he knew the villager Kiall would have been whipped. The Earl had done wrong to Kiall and his fellow villagers. Chareos felt as if Kiall didn’t desevre to be punished for the way he spoke to the Earl for he was speaking the turth.

As Chareos neared the town square he could hear the sound of the whip. He ran up to the man doing the whipping, ‘that’s enough’ Chareos told the man.

‘My orders were to whip ‘em...’

‘What ‘til he bled to death? Look at him he’s near ready to pass out!’

‘He insulted the Earl, he deserves to die.’

‘Only because he didn’t want to know the truth!’

‘Well I get my orders from the Earl, and he said to whip ‘em’ the man was about to make another whip but Chareos managed to stop him.

‘Stop it NOW!’ Chareos demanded.

‘Fine, take ‘em’ and Kiall was set free. However Chareos had to help him walk, the marks on his back were quite deep.

‘Thank you’ Kiall thanked Chareos.

The sun was setting as Chareos and Kiall left the city. It wasn’t long before Charoes realised that they wouldn’t made to to the village before dark so he decided to made camp. He set Kiall down while he started to made a fire.

The two men sat in silence for a long time until Kiall said ‘They took her. They took my Ravenna from me.’

‘Who was she?’ Chareos asked.

‘She’s the woman I’m going to marry.’

That’s why he wants every one to go and save the woman, Chareos thought.

‘I’m going to go after them! I’m going to save her!’ Kiall continued ‘you’re some kind of great warrior arent you?’

‘I am.’

‘Then you can help me?’

‘What to save your woman?’

‘Yea, I wont be able to do it by myself’ Kiall cried.

‘I will have to think about it’ replied Chareos.

Chareos though more about what the Earl said, he thought about the home he left when he was much, much younger and thought would his father do the same if he had the choice? Chareos reflected on what sort of Early he might have become if his home had not been lost.

I would defend my people Chareos said in his head before pushing the thought out of his mind.  

Later that night Kiall went up to Chareos ‘So will you help me?’

‘Yes, I will help you’ Chareos replied.

Commentary:

In the story by David Gemmell; Chareos is quite calm. He doesn’t think about his home land of Dreanan he thinks it’s best to forget what is lost and get on with life. Because of this approach to life; even though the Nadir attacked his home land and killed his family he does not hold a grudge. He is more focussed on preventing further ills occuring than gaining revenge. As I was reading Fanon (1995) I got my idea for my re-write from the following sentence “Hot headed with anger in their hearts, relentlessly determined to renew contact once more with the oldest and most pre-colonial springs of life of their people”.  My idea was to change Chareos to feel resentent to the Nadir for what they had done to his home land and his family. I wanted to write the story from the begining and work through the story from the attack on the village and Chareos and Kiall (the main character in the David Gemmell book) meeting. I was then planning on them going on to rescue Ravenna in which they enter what was once Dreanan. I was going to show as Said points out “the relationship between the Occident and the Orient is a relationship of power, of domination” which I was going to show how the Nadir treat the Dreani, now that they conquer them. This would reinforce the new feelings I was adding to the character of Chareos.

I tried to keep detail to the minimum as I wanted to keep the same feel as Gemmell’s novels have and they are quite a fast pace so I left out some descriptions that I normally would have added. However, I did find myself adding in detail (which I do with my own writing) in places where it wasn’t before. I had to achieve a balance between my own writing style and the fast pace captured by David Gemmell which make his books so appealing to me.

Reference

Said, E. (1995). Orientalism. In B. Ashcroft, G. Griffiths & H. Tiffine (Eds.) The Post-

Colonial Studies Reader (p.87-91). London: Routledge.

Fanon, F. (1995). National Culture. In B. Ashcroft, G. Griffiths & H. Tiffine (Eds.) The Post-

Colonial Studies Reader (p.153-157). London: Routledge.