There follows a summary of the stories so far – the first Chronicle from last year and this story of poor Princess Cordelia. This’ll save newcomers an almighty lot of reading!
The Chronicles of the Silver River concern the small but beautiful country of Aestria, surrounded by great mountains, and sandwiched between Svendia in the west and Draen in the east. Aestria finds itself the crucible of a struggle between darkness and light. Fighting the cause of righteousness, in the light corner we find Merlin, who visits Aestria under the guise of Paul, first as a servant in Castle Heidraen, now returned as the landlord of the Boar Inn. His greatest ally is Eulalia, High Priestess of the Silver River.
In the Naughty Corner was the Dark Princess, now returned in the guise of Lord Vulcan, Master of Darkness.
On each side, male and female celestial forces confronting each other, with the people of Aestria as pawns in the battle between them.
(Merlin /Paul has been popping up all over the world in various personalities for centuries, trying to frustrate the forces of darkness, in the process quite unintentionally triggering off various religions. He is in the unique position of having been flogged for taking his own name in vain. Eulalia has now settled in Aestria, but she, too, has popped up here and there over the centuries, and as St Eulalia has previously tasted a martyr’s death.)
Kings and Queens have the most impact on a country so they attract more trouble. Centuries before, King Jedakk the Great had felt the malign influence of the Dark Princess, such that he earned himself the nickname ‘the Crucifier’. But he’d also had some kind of mystic premonition which he set down in an account of his ‘deeds and prophecies’. In a nutshell, this predicted that a ‘son’ resulting from a union between a daughter of the royal line of Svendia and a son of the house of Heidraen would one day defeat the forces of darkness.
For years the dark forces prevented Svendian princesses from coming anwhere near Aestria, and also noted with satisfaction that Svendian princesses tended to produce girls, not boys. But when Queen Isopogon of Svendia produced two of the loveliest girls the world had ever seen, Barbaria and her ‘Little Siss’ Penelope, King Hengentre of Ystragarth and King Xsordon of Aestrador fell hopelessly in love and the cat was in amongst the pigeons.
More beautiful daughters: for Barbaria, Taranthala and Roxandra; for Siss, Blaire.
At the beginning of the first Chronicle King Sciuridan of Heidraen had got his son, Shevak, engaged to Blaire. You may think this would have bothered the Dark Princess but in fact Blaire would never have let Shevak touch her with a 20 foot bargepole – she was gay – so the Dark Princess was quite satisfied with that match.
But Shevak went and fell in love with Tara and this wouldn’t do at all – especially when the Dark Princess found she was carrying a male fetus. Poor Tara’s short life ended on a cross outside Heidraen, an event illustrated by Quoom in ‘Ornament of Triumph’, and when Roxie had discovered her sister's body and returned it to Ystragarth, civil war began in Aestria.
Shevak abandoned Heidraen and joined forces with Barbaria. In fact he joined with Barbaria in more ways than one and Barbaria enjoyed the benefits of Shevak’s legendary tongue, sufficiently long to reach her g-spot.
It is a fact that the forces of darkness consider crucifixion (preferably) or hanging to be the way to crush their enemies. The Dark Princess set herself to kill them all, including Shevak. Barbaria and Shevak were captured during the Siege of Ystragarth, Barbaria was crucified outside the walls of her own city, which did nothing for the morale of the citizens, and, when Erin was captured and crucified in a failed rescue attempt, Barb’s despair hit rock bottom. Shevak was nailed to a cross in a ravine on the Aestral Pass called the ‘Defile’, to act as a trap so that DP could trap Siss, Roxie, and Blaire. Paul saw what she was up to, and pre-warned, Siss thundered past Shevak’s cross on her horse and evaded capture. But he was just briefing Roxie and Blaire, as well as Shevak’s mother, Messaline of Gaul, when the Dark Princess attacked, Roxie and Blaire were captured, and DP killed both Paul and Messaline. Sadly, Messaline, being mortal, stayed dead, but Paul had been killed before, it’s an occupational hazard for him, and he was resurrected just as Yupar came past.
Paul and Yupar rescued Blaire and Roxie just as they were being hung, then captured the Dark Princess. Shevak was got down from his cross to be replaced by the Dark Princess herself.
Siss was able to get to Ystragarth and stand before Barbaria’s cross just as Barb was getting near the end. But Siss deliberately, and very bravely, provoked Sciuridan into crucifying her, but she made such a spectacle out of it that the besieging Heidraenese army was so busy watching her writhing and screaming that the Ystragarthians snuck out of the city and slaughtered them all. In the process Kings Hengentre and Sciuridan were both killed.
Siss, Erin, and Barbaria were rescued, not a moment too soon for the latter two.
While Shevak was recuperating, Roxie decided that she’d like to try and get the length of his tongue, she got that and more, in the process falling pregnant with Cordelia. But what nobody knew was that even as she hung on her cross Barbaria was carrying a male baby, Pilus.
The Dark Princess hung on her cross for a year, dying and resurrecting repeatedly, she’d also been blinded to prevent her from hypnotising passers-by, but eventually she was rescued by persons unknown. She disappeared, but in this second chronicle appears to have returned in the person of Lord Vulcan. He seems to now be going all out for revenge, and with Cordelia, Siss, Barb, Roxie and Blaire all now his prisoners things are looking very, very bleak indeed.
