The Story of MIRIAMA – part 3 - The Stone In Senuris

After a few days travel, Miriama and the two friends, Gotto and Fost reached the land of Senuris on the other side of the mountain but the Senuris that the two friends returned to was very different to that which they remembered.

When they had left home to trade salt with the Glacians, Senuris had been a happy bustling City. Now, however, it seemed abandoned,quiet and devestated. Left and right of them, they saw their peaceful golden city in ruins and not a soul around.

The only person that they could find was a blind beggar scrabbling for food among the ruins of a demolished and abandoned shop.

‘What has happened here and where is everyone?’ asked Gotto and Fost, dismayed, ‘was there a hurricane or an earthquake?’

‘No’, replied the beggar as he nibbled upon some bread, ‘Nothing so ordinary.’,‘The truth is that they have all been driven to their wits end by the light of a strange glowing jewel that fell from the stars some months back – they
call it the ‘blood stone’ because it has caused so much blood to be shed’.

The two brothers were absolutely horrified by this news. “But how could one jewel cause this kind of destruction?”,they asked.

‘Greed for the stone’,said the beggar, ‘Those that see it,they say,must possess it and,
when they own it, they must kill to keep possession of it. It is for this reason that
the land of Senuris became divided by civil war with those who possess the stone on one side fighting off those who wish to posess the stone’.

‘But’,asked Miriama,her curiosity aroused, ‘How could a jewel be so desirable as to divide a country?’.

‘They say’, said the beggar, ‘that the jewel is so beautiful that it is like a keyhole through which to peer into heaven but I can only repeat what others have told me for,being blind,I have never seen the jewel for myself’.

It was Miriama that then decided what should be done, ‘ to save this land of yours from destroying itself’,she said, ‘ we must get rid of this terrible jewel and only hope that the madness it has created will pass’.

To this end Miriama and the two friends,Gotto and Fost, journeyed to the town of Dromfree where,they had been told, the strange jewel was being kept within a fort built by ‘the Militia’, a group which had gathered around the stone. They
took the blind beggar with them because only he could handle the stone without being mezmerised
by its beauty.

But,on the way, they stopped in the Grenevole woods to capture the giant skunk like creature called a Gruffart, ‘This,we will need’,said Miriama, ‘if our plan is to succeed’.

The Gruffart was an infamous denizen of the wild woodlands of Senuris, infamous for being one of the most noxiously smelly creatures in the whole world – like a Skunk but six times as large and one hundred times more noxious,its odour would cause you to be uncontrollably sick before falling unconcious and if that was not bad enough it was also a ferocious fighter with eight inch tusks.

In order to capture a Gruffart, Miriama made a trap baited with its favourite food, the scaly fruit of the Pungee tree and then,carrying it in a box,they took it with them to the town of Dromfree.

It was during this time,also,that Stellany, the girl who had turned herself into a Ladybird in order to crawl inside Miriama/Riams diamond armour revealed herself to Riam in a state of some distress.

“You – you – you are not”,she blurted tearfully before running away into the night, not to return until later in the story.

When they reached the fortress of Dromfree, it was dark and most of its inhabitance were sleeping, apart from a few guards who patrolled its battlements. Miriama,with the strength of twenty men could have easily dealt with them and her bull Nangy could have smashed down the fortress gates with a single charge but Miriama
did not want to cause a commotion that would wake all the people in the fortress and so, holding a long rope,Miriama scaled the north facing wall of the fortress and,asking god for forgiveness, used the rope to strangle the guard,then Gotto and Fost tied the other end of the rope around the box which contained the Gruffart and Miriama hoisted the box up before lowering it into the fort and,holding her breath, releasing the noxious beast to run wild.

They did not have to wait very long for their plan to take effect. Soon the inhabitance
of the fort who had been woken by the terrible smell,came flooding out of the front entrance of the fortress,gasping for air. Some of the guards attempted to kill the Gruffart but a Gruffart,
when enraged,is a formidable opponent and the angry beast killed two of the guards with its long tusks and claws before the others ran in terror.

Now,while all was confusion inside, Miriama and the friends Gotto, Fost and the blind beggar,wearing protective masks made from the sweet smelling jonton flower, headed to the room where, they had been informed,the evil jewel was being kept.

The jewel was placed on public display so that all the Militiamen could gaze upon it and it was guarded by four of the militias fiercest guards who would not desert their posts,for fear of leaving the jewel,which had everyone in its spell,unguarded.

With the remarkable strength that had been given to her by god, Miriama fought off all of the guards, while the blind beggar lifted the evil bloodstone from off of its altar and placed it into a sack.

With the stone now in their possession,they made their exit and as the sun was rising they rode off towards the great Copper lake of Senuris,a lake of enormous depth and rowing out into the very middle of the lake hurled the sack that contained the jewel, which they had also filled with heavy rocks,down into it.

The evil bloodstone sank to the bottom of the lake never to be seen by human eyes again and peace and sanity once again returned to the land of Senuris.

Now,thought, Miriama it was time to leave Senuris and head into the neighbouring Land of Lemuria,
the place where her mother had asked her to journey to.

Saying goodbye to the two friends, Gotto and Fost, she mounted her faithful bull and headed onwards along the great Southern road towards the land of Lemuria.

It was on this road that Miriama once again met up with Stellany who was being accosted by Lemurian bandits.

Miriama immediately launched herself upon the cowardly group,seriously wounding two and sending the others fleeing. Having rescued Stellany from the bandits, Miriama placed her upon her bull and, walking beside them, she traveled to Lemuria.